


One Mistake

by AnxiousMuse



Category: Pitch Black (2000)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-26
Updated: 2016-09-26
Packaged: 2018-08-17 10:56:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 48,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8141327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnxiousMuse/pseuds/AnxiousMuse
Summary: A woman helped a convict. Now because of this she has become just as much a convict as he. Now, the only one who can save her, is the one who condemned her in the first place.  Riddick/OC





	1. Introduction

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Guys I wrote this fic when I was 15/16. The only reason I still have it and am posting it now is because I wrote a one-shot sequel fic recently that features the OC that I introduced in this fic, and won't make sense without this fic alongside it. So...be gentle. I haven't edited it despite wanting to, and I've left my author's notes that I wrote at the time intact.

Author's Notes: I'm not…entirely sure where this is going to go. I'm also not entirely sure when and where inspiration strikes me to update. It could be a few days. Could be a few months. It's never really clear. So please…don't piss me off by bugging me to update. I'm just going to take longer if you do that. Reviews would be nice though, as long as they aren't flaming me beyond belief. Thanks. I'm still deciding whether it's before or after Pitch Black. I haven't even SEEN Chronicles of Riddick, so yeah…  
________________________________________  
How the fuck did I get myself into this? This was the only conscious thought that could really make it through her jumbled up brain as she crouched behind a dumpster in a dark alleyway, rain pounding her shivering form. The seemingly unending train of police vehicles behind her on the street were reflecting blue and red strobe lights off the rain-soaked alley walls, giving her face an eerie desperate look as she tried to think. No where to run; the alley was a dead end, and the cops were going back and forth on the only other exit to the area.  
The dogs couldn't find her because of the rain. At least that's what she hoped, because if that wasn't the case she was going to have to move soon. Her hands couldn't stop shaking as she gripped the edge of the dumpster, as if afraid that if she let go that gravity would release it's hold on her and send her spiralling up into the stratosphere to slowly suffocate. This was how Alicia Terries had ended up after one small encounter with a man named Richard B. Riddick.

Nobody would believe this was happening to Alicia, of all people. She couldn't even believe it herself. Alicia had been the model for the word goody-two-shoes. Hell, she'd never even met a police officer before; that was how far away from trouble she had always stayed. The security prison was a good forty or fifty miles away from her neighbourhood, and it was so rarely spoken of that you would think it didn't even exist. It was just an object of the fertile imaginations of the people. Public relations, you see, they didn't want everybody moving away just because they thought some escaped convict would murder them.  
________________________________________  
It had been nearly two in the morning. Something had kept her from sleep, but it wasn't until a lot later than she would realise that it was obviously some sort of higher power playing with her mind, setting her on the course to where she was now. Fucking bastards. Without explaining to herself why she thought it would help, she had opened her front door and stepped out, clad in only a loose white tank top and dark blue sweat pants, the clothes that served as her pyjamas, and that was when she'd seen him. Not well, mind you, seeing as it was nearly pitch black outside that night, but the movement had been enough to catch her eye. Goggles were sitting on top of his shaved head, and a trick of the light (or at least that's what she'd thought at the time) had made his eyes seem to almost glow in the dark, and even from afar she could see that he was huge. One hand could probably wrap around her neck without any difficulty and squeeze the life from her.

He was obviously injured, limping, and against her better judgement she had moved forward slightly to get a better look at him in the dark. It looked like he was bleeding badly from an injury in his leg and she'd watched with a gasp as he fell to his knees on the pavement. Despite the obvious idiocy of running into the dark street to a strange man with a shaved head, wearing all black and with goggles on his head, she wasn't really thinking that clearly. Crouching, she gasped as she looked at the long bloody trail that went all along the road from whence the man had come, not from the gaping wound in his lower leg, but from the slowly oozing pool of blood on his stomach. Oh. My. God.

"Get up…come on…I'm going to help…" She whispered, trying to pull him to his feet, but it was useless. He was half-unconscious, and she ended up dragging him most of the way, him half-getting up a couple times. In the end, she dropped him (by accident of course) on to the floor of her living room and closed the front door of her house. Deciding that there was no fucking way she could lift the dead weight up onto the couch, her hands fumbled with the phone, trying to dial the number for emergency, but she couldn't seem to remember what the numbers were. Her white tank top was stained with his blood beyond recognition and her hands were leaving bloody smears over everything, and she felt disoriented by the amount of it, dizzy.

Alicia ended up dropping the phone and stumbling to her bathroom, first to vomit what was left of her dinner into the toilet, then to grab almost literally the entire contents of her medicine cabinet. The man was still where she'd left him, lying prone on his back in the living room. At least I don't have to roll him over. Some ironic part of her reasoned, and she knelt, pouring water all over his stomach in an attempt to clean off the wound enough that she could at least see it. It was a bullet hole, she realised with a gasp, her hand dropping the bottle of the water with a muffled thud on the hardwood floor, and it's contents spilling to pool around the figure, who had not moved the entire time.

Oh god, please say he didn't die…that'll be difficult to explain. He just HAPPENED to die of a bullet-wound in my house, officer, honestly! Yeah, that'll go over fucking well. However, she could still hear, if she focussed, the ragged in and out of his breathing, and she went back to the task at hand. The bullet was still in there, she realised, gagging. Luckily she had nothing left to vomit, or she would have as she examined the wound. The bullet had to be taken out. That was not something she could do.

"I've got to call an ambulance…" Alicia said out loud, not sure why, considering that the man was obviously totally out of hearing, and turned, grabbing the phone from where it had fallen on the floor just before the water shorted it out. Just as her fingers were pressing the buttons, there was something cold and sharp at her throat and her breath hitched in her throat as she felt the cold force behind it.

"Hang up the phone." The voice was like listening to thunder over a lake, deep and rumbling, with a threatening quality that showed that he had no qualms about killing her. Alicia was breathing hard, but did as she was told, placing the phone back on it's cradle with shaking fingers, though it nearly fell to the floor on it's way over. For a few moments there was silence, but there was no loosening of the hold on her throat, and she could feel his warm breath pushing lightly against the hairs at the back of her neck. Had she not been terrified for her life, she might have been uncomfortable with the closeness of him. At the moment, however, she was more worried that he was going to slit her throat. After a few more seconds of silence, she finally had to speak.

"P-please, d-don't kill me, I b-beg y-" Before she could even finish what she was saying, she was flipped over on to her back, and pinned to the floor, his knees pinning her legs to the ground, his upper torso pinning her arms, and the knife was thrust back at her throat. Her eyes widened as she looked up into the dark glowing orbs directly above her. "Y-your e-eyes…" She whispered, despite the obvious inappropriateness of the situation.

"Shut the fuck up!" He said roughly, and her breath hitched again as the curved knife (or shiv, more accurately) was shoved up against her throat harder. "Why are you trying to fucking help me?" It was the last thing she expected him to ask at the moment, and for a moment she was struck silent, but as he pressed the shiv a bit more, she was quickly provoked into speaking.  
"You were bleeding badly and you looked like you needed help, so I decided I'd bring you in and call emergency, I didn't even realise you were a…." Finishing her sentence for her, there came the sounds of police sirens, and then there was the reflection of blue and red lights through her front window as a police car went by her house, with someone speaking through a loudspeaker. Apparently the fact that it was nearly three in the morning was of no consequence to them.

"Attention! Attention! This is a warning to all citizens of this city that a very dangerous criminal has escaped from the Planetary Penitentiary. We advise that you lock all windows and doors and leave lights on. Do not panic. Repeat. Do Not Panic." The message was repeated as they continued down the street, and then started to fade away as it turned the corner and started headed towards the next street. There went any hope of aid. The man, who hadn't even looked up when the police cars went by, was studying her, with something that might have been vague interest in his otherwise emotionless eyes.

For a little while there was no sound other than the slow dripping of his blood, which sounded eerily like a ticking clock, reminding both of them that there was not a lot of time left, and she could feel the warmth of it through her tank top as it dripped against her stomach. Finally the silence proved too much, and she had to break it, because the uncertainty of there being a tomorrow for her was grating at her nerves and her sanity. Because of this desperation, she snapped out with more force than she intended.

"Look, you have a bullet wound, you need medical help!" Her voice shook as she looked up into those cold emotionless eyes, trying to gauge how many minutes of life were left, and how many of those she should spend praying that it wasn't the end just yet. There were a few more seconds of silence as he regarded her carefully, then he spoke, without shifting his weight, though he pulled the shiv away from her throat.

"You're wrong. I don't need help. But I do need some equipment. I see you have bandages, some antiseptic…" He motioned to the previously ignored items now lying scattered on the ground, before turning the eyes back on her. "I can get the bullet out and stitch it myself, I just need a needle and some thread…are you still willing to help me?" Alicia didn't answer for a second, then slowly nodded, and he read the truth in her eyes as he backed off, letting her sit up. "Don't try anything funny…I can kill you in about two seconds flat."

Alicia nodded, before standing up and stumbling into her kitchen, looking over her shoulder every few seconds to make sure he wasn't sneaking up on her. Once she was clear, she considered running, but something stopped her. She could have got away, the neighbour's house was nearly close enough to touch just out the kitchen door, but…something about this man made her think. He could have killed her and found the needle and thread himself, but he hadn't. Could have raped her, then killed her and found what he wanted, but he hadn't. He could have done a lot of things vile, hideous and unforgivable, but he hadn't. Maybe there was something in him that was human after all. Finally, after standing still for a few minutes, she started to rummage through drawers, finally finding an emergency patching kit she had received in a gift box or something of the like and tossed in a drawer just to get it out from underfoot. About to return to the living room, she paused, looking at the needle. It should be sanitised, or else he could get a disease or something…

A sneaky voice was asking her why she cared if he got a disease, but she was already looking for a way to sanitise the needle. With nothing better, she pulled out a matchbox, and struck it, holding the needle to it as long as she could until her fingers started to smart. Turning, she nearly screamed as the dark menacing form in the doorway came into sharp focus all at once, and she found herself looking, not into the glowing eyes of before, but a pair of reflective goggles, reflecting her own terrified image back at her. She hadn't even heard him move from the living room. Although she would never have said this out loud, in the dark, the goggles made her think of a huge bug. Unfortunately, this bug couldn't be swatted without a great fear for one's own health.

"I never introduced myself." The man said casually, as if he were at a dinner party, holding a glass of wine in one hand, and making casual conversation with the host. "The name's Richard B. Riddick." The name sent shockwaves through her system, as thousands of newspaper headlines flashed through her mind. They all told of the horrible murders that the infamous Richard B. Riddick had committed, how he'd escaped from a triple max security prison…the list was unending as the names and faces of the victims flashed through her mind. How had she not seen it? His picture had been published everywhere, wanted posters, newspapers, and even in libraries. The only explanation she could come up with was that she hadn't wanted to see it, or that it was because of the dark. Realising that he was waiting for her to introduce herself, she took a deep breath and held out the needle and the thread with a gulp.

"Alicia Terries." She whispered hoarsely as he took the items from her hands and was surprised at how gentle his touch was. She had expected him to snatch them from her hand roughly, telling her how he was going to kill her the second he was finished. Considering all the tales she'd been told of him, she'd made him out to be some sort of pyschopath who would rather spend his time killing people for no reasons, and would have limited vocal skills. The modern caveman. Yet here was this man, standing in her kitchen, making conversation and speaking intelligently, and he had even sheathed the shiv.

"A pleasure to have threatened you, Alicia." He said, before turning and disappearing into the living room, then through to the bathroom, as if he already knew where it was, leaving her standing in the middle of the kitchen, covered in his blood, wondering what to do now. She could have run for it now, for sure, he was in the bathroom, though the door was wide open, and the kitchen door was less than five feet from her. As much as her mind was saying this, her legs weren't responding, and she found herself walking back into the living room and sitting on the couch, ignorant of the mixture of blood and water that was staining her floor as they spoke.

Then there was the sound of dogs barking, coming closer, and she frowned, standing up and walking to the window, peering out through the curtains. There shouldn't be anybody out walking their dogs at this time of morning… Through the window, she could see wildly swinging rays of light, coming along the dark street, and a great many hound-dogs, probably five or six, all running frantically, stopping every so often to smell the ground. They were followed by a bunch of men in uniform, all holding guns and she gasped, putting two and two together. They were nearly where Riddick had fallen to his knees, where, if they were really on his scent, they would turn and walk right up her front walk and straight to her door. For a moment there was nothing. No thoughts, no emotions, just staring blankly at the dogs as they paused exactly where she said they would. Then something kicked in.

A life for a life…With that one, single, blind thought, she turned and ran straight to her kitchen, and came back out with Cayenne Pepper in her hand: the one thing that could turn a hound dog off the trail. The dogs were coming up the walk now, followed by the men, who had their guns trained on her door. Not enough time! Fuck! Racing across the living room, she nearly crashed into the wall as she skidded on the wet hardwood, leaning down to snatch up the bandages and antiseptic from the floor, before grabbing the bathroom doorframe as support. She stood silhouetted, staring at Riddick, wondering if she had lost her mind. The image that met her eyes made her throat close up and she started gagging before she could get a word of warning out.

In the sink was the bloody bullet, and his hands were bloody, so he had obviously fished it out himself. She hadn't heard a sound of pain from the bathroom, and he was now stitching himself up without even a wince. Even just watching him do it made her turn pale, and she took a deep breath. It was so bloody, that she very nearly passed out at that exact moment, but held herself up, holding out the pepper to Riddick.

"Dogs. Cops. Go out the window." Pointing at the bathroom window which led to the back of the house, she shoved the Cayenne pepper into his hand, as well as the bandages and antiseptic which were a bit damp, but still useable. "A life for a life." Riddick looked at her, registering the only emotion she had ever seen on his face. Surprise. Then, more oddly, admiration…for her? Then he was moving, out of the window, but he paused and looked back at her, and an odd smile crossed his face.

"I won't forget this...Alicia." With that, he was gone, and she was closing the window and her heart nearly jumped out of her chest as somebody pounded hard on the door, and she looked frantically around the living room. It was covered in blood from Riddick, as was she, and there was no way she could clean it up now or even get into non-bloody clothes before they'd just break their way in. Finally, she opened the door just a crack, not even enough for them to see anything but her face and neck.

"Yeah? What the fuck do you want, disturbing me at four o'clock in the fucking morning? It better be fucking important." She said, glaring at the five of them, trying to make them wilt, but none of them even reacted, in fact they didn't even ask her if they could come in. They just came in, shoving her out of the way, and she stumbled and fell to the ground, revealing how bloody she was, and how bloody the room was. Fuck. A news report's line ran through her head momentarily, from a few years ago:  
"The murderer known as Riddick has escaped once again from police custody. Those now searching for him have been given orders to shoot on sight, and also to shoot anybody they believe could have aided his escape…more information to come." 

Time was slowing as the guard's were pointing their guns at her. There could be no doubt that she had helped him get out of her house alive. They had their orders and were willing and ready to obey them, even if it meant killing an almost totally innocent young woman. Each of those shiny metal barrels glinted lethally in the small amount of light that there was in the room. Her eyes darted around the room. The front door was blocked, the bedroom was out of reach…There was only one escape now. The bathroom. Screaming, she lifted herself and flung herself into the bathroom, just as shots began to fire, one of them embedding itself into the mirror, shattering it into a million deadly pieces, all reflecting her image into thousands of different angles. She slammed and locked the door, then ran to the window, forcing it open before leaping out into the night, falling on to the ground with a thud before racing away. Towards the city.

Just then, both mercifully and fatefully, it began to rain. Not just a little sprinkling, I mean heavy, driving rain that coated her in seconds. It was so thick that she could barely see three feet in front of her, and she knew it was masking her scent. Whatever higher power liked her, they had come through for her again.

((Yeah, it's not that good, I know. It will get better, I promise. Review…maybe? That would be nice if someone did…okay, next chapter will be up really really soon. I'm working on it even as I write this.))


	2. Crash and Burn

((Here we go, updating again Um…no real comments, I didn't get a lot of reviews, but that's okay. Hopefully more people will review for this chapter! There's a plot twist which you will see as it gets farther in… ))

The rain hadn't let up once in over two hours, and Alicia had been forced to move when her chattering teeth started echoing off the alley walls. Rubbing her arms, she had stood up, still standing in the shadows, trying to warm up. It was hopeless. There was no where she could go. Home was out of the question; they were probably searching it as she stood there in the rain. Friends? Back in her old town, but no good ones here. No one she could trust wouldn't turn her in to the authorities. Same deal with family. The rain masked the tears of desperation that flowed slowly from her eyes.

"I won't forget this…Alicia." Yeah well, fat lot of good it's doing me now… Alicia thought to herself, wondering, not for the first time, what the fuck she'd been thinking when she'd decided to help a convicted murderer escape. He was probably now stowing away on some ship, heading off the planet, where he would be out of the jurisdiction of the authorities. Once he was off the planet, only mercs could get him, which was probably the way he liked it. Not that she would have expected any help from him in the first place. Just as she was contemplating handing herself in and pleading for an easy punishment, whatever higher power believed in her decided to make themselves known again.

"Hey! Kid! Over here!" Lowering her eyes from where she'd been watching what looked like the beginning of the sunrise, she gasped as a quick flash of lightening lit up the sturdy body of a man, tattoos all over his arms, and a knife in his belt, leaning out of a door that had mysteriously appeared across the alleyway. When she didn't move, the man glanced around, then came out a bit more. "C'mon, are you deaf or somethin? I'm not gonna hand ya in ta the coppers, if that's what your worried 'bout. Just c'mon, get outta the rain." She hesitated, then, seeing as it was either definitely get killed by the cops, or only possibly be killed by this stranger, she moved forward, and slid through the door. The door was closed, and even if you'd seen it open and close, you wouldn't have been able to find it again, the camouflage was so perfect.

As she stood shivering, in the dark, somebody switched on a light, and she looked around at this new scenery. The place was almost totally concrete, with a ragged brown couch sitting in the middle; the cushions stained with something that looked disgustingly like blood. There was also a table, stainless steel; with four uncomfortable looking chairs placed around it haphazardly. Her bare feet were bleeding from something sharp she'd stepped on, and now that the rain wasn't falling to wash it away, it began to pool onto the freezing cold concrete floor. Meanwhile, the man, who she now saw was similar to Riddick in body-type, though no where near as muscular or huge, was walking across the room, heading towards a counter which seemed to hold medical supplies. Shivering, she crossed her arms across herself, to hide anything the wet might be revealing, then walked across the floor, leaving bloody footprints behind her.

"W-who are you?" Alicia finally asked, and he looked up and grinned almost sadistically, his dark black eyes watching her every movement, short black hair plastered to his scalp from the wet. Without answering her question, he continued rummaging through items on the counter, finally coming up with some bandages, and what looked like it might be antiseptic.  
"The name is Nefari…Taylor A. Nefari." He said finally as she sat down, and he picked up her feet, cleaning them off with water as he spoke. Wincing and taking a sharp intake of breath as he poured antiseptic all over her feet, she watched as he then stuck on a couple bandages on the bigger cuts. "That should heal in a few hours. Now, Miss Terries. As I said before, I'm not gonna hand ya in to the cops. My job, that is, what people pay me ta do, is to help convicts lay low until the heat's off. Then I help 'em get off the planet and free." Alicia frowned, and thought this over. She had no access to her money at the moment, so who was paying for his aid? Nefari was still speaking, as if he hadn't even noticed her frown.

"Now, the way I see it, the heat will be off for ya after about a week or two. Then they'll be focussin' all their attentions on re-catching Riddick. So you should just stay here for a while. There's clothes for ya, and lots of food…you should be just fine." Standing up, he started to walk towards the door again, and she half-stood up, which made it feel as if someone were sticking burning needles into the bottom of her feet. "I'll come ta check on ya tomorrow night, make sure your still alive."

"But wait!" Nefari paused and turned to her, black eyes glinting in the light, reminding her very strongly of those moments in which she had been uncertain of her own life, staring up into the never-ending shining pools that were Riddick's eyes. Bringing her mind back to the moment, she looked at him with a confused look. "How will I pay for your services?" Nefari gave an odd smile, as if he knew something that she didn't, before answering.

"Don't worry. It's been taken care of." With that, he left, and the door slammed behind him, leaving her alone with her thoughts.

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A week passed, and then two, but the search for her did not stop or even slacken. Although she rarely risked leaving the concrete room that had become both her sanctuary and her prison, the few times she did, there were still police cars circling the streets, and her face had been added to the wanted posters. There was even a bounty placed on her head, a relatively small one, but a bounty, nonetheless. The police were desperate to send out the message that you couldn't get away with aiding convicts, no matter how small that aid was.

Every few days, Nefari would stop in with more supplies and information, and every time she would again try to pry out who was paying for her safety. The tactics she used had no effect on him, however, even when she offered herself as a last-ditch effort. 'It's been taken care of' was always the answer she received, frustrating her beyond belief.

During those 'discussions', however, she found out a lot about her 'safekeeper'. Although he had all the looks of a convict, he had never been arrested for anything in his entire life, keeping just on the good side of the law. What she got from his tone was that he had never been caught, more than that he had never done anything wrong. He had a family, his mom and dad were still alive back on earth, and his little sister was in college at the moment. He even showed her a picture, and she could see that, despite his rough appearance, he really did care for his family.

Finally, after nearly a month of being a sitting duck waiting for the hunters to find her, she had accosted Nefari with a desperate plea to get her a way off of this planet. She could not sit in the room anymore; she was teetering on the edge of insanity as it was, what with rarely getting any fresh air and never getting any daylight. Plus there was almost literally nothing to do in the concrete prison other than listening to the time go ticking by on the clock that wasn't there.

Nefari had frowned, saying he didn't know, but he would see what he could do, and return in a couple days with the information. Possibly that information had been all that had kept her from going crazy the next few days, as she'd paced the room, looked at the door, bit her lip, then kept pacing. A couple days earlier they had been given the information that Riddick had been captured by a merc, and that he was being taken on a transport ship with civilians, heading off to another slam. It wasn't until a few days later that Nefari came up with the brilliant scheme.

"I've got it!" He said suddenly, and started to laugh lightly, and she looked at him from where she'd been sitting, absently flicking at a spring on the couch, and wondering if maybe he'd lost his marbles. "I've got how we can both get you out of here, and get Riddick out of having to escape another slam." He'd outlined his plan to her, and it was the last, literally, the last thing she would have expected she would have ever agreed to. But she had.

The flight that Riddick was taking was full of civilians, all of them on their way to New Mecca, and the trip was sufficiently long enough that they were all being kept in cryogenic chambers, to be awoken when they got nearer their destination. Nefari would pay for her ticket, and she would climb aboard, and pretend to go to sleep as if she were a civilian. When the time was right, she would exit and spring Riddick from his own cryogenic sleep and they'd both take over the ship, and get the hell off of it as soon as they had the chance. The only uncertainty of the whole plan was whether Riddick would go along with it. He had never been one to agree with getting help from other people. The other uncertainty only existed in her mind.

Riddick had condemned her in the first place, forced her to nearly go insane in the dark prison-like world of a convict, and had done nothing. So why, why should she go to great lengths to save his sorry ass? In fact, she was seriously considering just leaving him on the ship as soon as it arrived at New Mecca. This plan played out in her mind, and she found herself actually pondering the technicalities of doing it, as Nefari dyed her hair, changing it from it's dark black to a very dark blonde colour that she absolutely hated. As much as she pleaded, he threatened to draw back on the deal, so she sullenly agreed to wear the contacts that would change the colour of her eyes from green to brown.

________________________________________  
It wasn't until the late hours of the night before the trip that her fears began to emerge in her mind. What if I'm discovered? What if I accidentally blow my cover? What if Riddick kills me for trying to help him? What if…what if…Eventually, her eyes had closed, with those two ominous words swaying like gentle waves around her head: What…if…

_Rain. The rain poured down constantly, and she was soaked. Was she back in the alleyway? No, it couldn't be…it was too dark, and there were odd shrieks coming from somewhere just outside of the flickering circle of light that surrounded her. The light emitted from the bottle of expensive alcohol in her hand, which had been fashioned into a torch, a wick disappearing down into the red liquid. If she held the light forward a bit, there would be the sound of scuttling as someone; no…something moved to stay out of the light. What terrified her was that she seemed to be alone, with no protection but the light that she held and her hands. As she watched, the flame was slowly flickering into darkness from the rain._

_Without even being able to explain how she knew…she knew that if the light went out…she was dead. She opened her mouth to scream for help, but suddenly the sound of scuttling behind her forced her to twirl. There were two of them! No…not just two…as she stood, she could hear them all, circling just outside of the light, waiting…waiting for the lights to go out. Thousands of unearthly wails, the sound of demons, echoed around her. Suddenly, just as the flame was about to sputter and die, there was a light that burst into existence to her right, and the shadow carrying it advanced, scattering the creatures in it's wake, and just before the lights shined right into her eyes, blinding her, she caught a glimpse of glowing dark eyes…_

Then she was awake, breathing heavily, staring at the dark ceiling above her head; the afterimage of those eyes burned into her retina for a few more seconds before fading away like smoke in the breeze. Sitting up, she almost expected to see those eyes staring down at her in the darkness, daring her to try and leave him to go to the slam. All she saw, however, was the dark room; for some reason this now made her uncomfortable, and she was almost afraid to get out of bed. Just a nightmare, that's all…a very, very odd nightmare…but a nightmare, nonetheless. Even so, it was a long while before she fell back asleep, and in the end she had to snap on a light, just to make absolute sure that there was nothing in her room.

By the next morning, the dream had been completely forgotten, and she was fully ready and able to board the ship with her luggage. Her 'luggage' consisted of a suitcase with all the things she needed to go into hiding. All her new ID cards, which read Sara Aicila in nice neat letters, along with a smiling picture of her new self, without her glasses on, though she still needed them, the damn things. There were some clothes, a lot of cash to get herself started before she managed to get a job, and, tucked away deep out of prying eyes way, there was a small pistol, for self-defence should the mercs get on her trail.

There was no doubt about her being afraid of discovery, but she didn't show it, her head held high, even beneath the black cloak that shielded her from the prying eyes of the police as she walked by. She was alone, Nefari couldn't risk coming with her, because people were beginning to suspect what his 'true' line of work was, and he had to lay low for a little while. A final goodbye was said, and they had embraced like sister and brother, and she'd thanked him immensely for everything he'd done, promising to send word as soon as she got on her feet, though he advised her this was not the wisest thing to do.

She was the first to board, and climbed into a cryogenic chamber, though she didn't close the lid. Whenever someone came around, holding a needle or anything, she would close her eyes and lean back as if asleep. Her heart was racing however, despite the fact that her heart rate was supposed to slow while in cryo-sleep. Finally, in he came, and despite her resolve that she wasn't going to help him, she had to frown, watching him from under almost totally closed lids. A man with a gun was pushing him along, obviously the merc who had captured him, though she couldn't see how this guy was anything of a match for Riddick. He was a spindly guy in comparison to Riddick, however, according to the limited news that she had received, Riddick had been captured in broad daylight, his downfall. Somebody must have managed to yank the goggles off his eyes, blinding him. That was a dirty trick.

Riddick was blindfolded, and there was a bit in his mouth (he wasn't a horse, for fuck's sake, those bastards), plus chains on both his wrists and his ankles, and she could see it was difficult for him to walk. As he passed her, he almost paused, and she watched his head turning towards her as if he could see through the blindfold, and her heart rate began to quicken again. He knows I'm here. Was the irrational thought that nearly had her bolting for the exit, sure that Riddick was going to point her out any moment now. With a supreme amount of effort, she stayed still, though a muscle in her arm and in her neck twitched, and she watched as he was placed into a reinforced cryogenic chamber, and a clear liquid inserted into his arm. They closed his door, and then somebody came over and closed hers, and then she felt the unfamiliar rumbling of the ship's engine as it took off, then settled into normal flight.

An hour passed…then another…and finally the ship's captain and crew came and climbed into their own cryogenic compartments, and she waited until she was listening to their super-slow heartbeat before finally letting out the breath she'd been holding in a long hiss. It was uncertain whether Riddick was asleep, for the blindfold covered his eyes, but she assumed he was. After all, the fluid had been injected in his case, which should have sent him to sleep almost immediately. In the end, the gases in the chamber sent her into a sort of semi-cryo sleep, so that she was dozing for a few days at a time before she would wake again, and would spend a few minutes just watching Riddick, wondering what had gone through his mind when he'd sensed her presence.  
________________________________________  
The weeks passed, and every few weeks she would step out of her compartment to stretch her cramped legs and arms, but she never dared go near to Riddick's compartment, inexplicably afraid of him. It wasn't until the 20th week or so out (She's lost count a while back) that she finally got the nerve to stand in front of him, looking up at his blindfolded eyes.

"I guess you can't hear me…" She whispered, more to herself than to the supposedly sleeping Riddick, who was heavily chained in, with obviously no way of getting out, even if there was a point. After all, they were still in the middle of space, with about 40+ passengers. Even if they were civilians, if they banded together, not even Riddick could withstand them all. At least she didn't think so. Turning her mind back to the chained up convict in front of her, she glared at him.

"This is all your fucking fault. What the hell did you do, brainwash me? All I would have had to do was let the dogs and the men find you, and then I probably would have had a reward…not a bounty. People think I'm somehow in league with you, even though those brief words were the only ones I ever spoke to you." Somehow the fact that he was asleep and within a box, unable to reach her, made her more bold, and knowing that she would never say any of these things to him while he was awake and alert, decided to get it out of her system now. "Now I'm a convict. I had a life, I had friends, I had family…now I'm nothing more than another face on a wanted poster…all thanks to you. You said you 'wouldn't forget this'. What the fuck was that supposed to mean? Supposed to comfort me as I was getting my brains blown out that you were grateful? Well, thanks. Thanks a fucking lot, Richard B. Riddick."

As she turned and returned to her chamber, the almost imperceptible twitch in his neck went unnoticed, the only indication that he was awake, and had heard every word. Whether it was anger or pain couldn't be told unless you could go inside the mind of Riddick…and nobody would have ever dared to risk the memories that rested there. After all…not all the details were known of his killings…and nobody wanted to know the ones that weren't known.

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Two more weeks passed, and then suddenly, one innocent night (or day? It was impossible to tell in space, with no constantly revolving sun) she was shaken out of a dreamless sleep by the sounds of alarms and the ship violently shaking back and forth, knocking her into the walls of her chamber. Looking out of the door in alarm, she saw something burn straight through the walls of the ship and fling itself into the captain's chamber, piercing his body, and he was shaking like he was having a seizure as each one hit. Then he half-flung forward, his head sending spider-web cracks through the glass, bloody flowing freely from his chest. Even over the alarms, she could hear the heart monitor flat-line.

Fuck, what is going on? Shaken now, and having the feeling of claustrophobia and panic that she could be next, she started to reach for the emergency release, then quickly stopped as a nearby compartment opened. Out came the docking pilot, Carolyn Fry, a tough, no-nonsense woman with very short brownish blonde hair and blue eyes, swiftly followed by the docking pilot, Greg Owens, a young man with short curly brown ringlets, who fell directly on top of her. They were disoriented, she could hear Owens saying something about how gravity wasn't supposed to kick in for another nineteen weeks. However, it apparently had malfunctioned, because she had been walking around ever since at least the fifth or sixth week in.

Finally, Fry managed to alert him to the fact that the Captain was dead. There was a second of stunned silence, and then they were both up and running, trying to fix whatever the hell was wrong. Now she could get out. Reaching for the emergency handle, the ship pushed her against the side of the chamber again, and she was breathing heavily, trying to grasp the handle to fling herself out. Yanking it down, she braced for being flung out. Nothing. The door didn't open. Panicking now, she yanked on the handle again, but nothing happened, and her breathing increased, hyperventilating, and soon she found herself pushing frantically against the glass, which refused to break.

Through a haze of panic, she heard the sound of the hatch closing between the passengers and the flight decks, but the sound barely registered. What felt like hours passed as she tried again and again to get the door to open, but there was nothing she could use to break the glass, and the handle refused to work. Suddenly, everything lurched, and her compartment fell diagonally, and for a brief moment teetered on its corner. Then, with a loud crashing noise, it fell forward, and she felt herself slip into unconsciousness, even as all light was blocked.

((Ta Da! Chapter 2! And I was done so quickly, aren't you proud of me? So yeah, I sort of ended up changing the plot, as you probably noticed, and I hope you enjoyed it, I will be working on Chapter 3 (even as we speak, again) and…yeah! Review please!))


	3. Death In A Grave

((And now Chapter 3! Sorry this one took a bit longer than the others, it's because I had to do my online school work all this week, and I could only get small breaks…so it might be a bit choppy. Anyway! Hope you enjoy this next chapter!))

It took a lot of effort to force her eyes open, once she woke up. How long had she been unconscious? Almost everything was bruised from being flung around the small, enclosed box, but now everything was still. Something warm was trickling down her forehead, and she reached up with difficulty, feeling the blood on her skin. There had been no difference in the level of darkness when she'd finally forced her eyes open, and she suddenly realised with a flutter of panic that her box was upside down on the ground, with the exit facing the unyielding metal floor. That's what she felt at least, when she gingerly searched for breaks in the glass, being able to put her fingers through the biggest one. Cold metal flooring, which meant she was still in the ship at least.

Claustrophobia and panic began to set in as she pushed against the floor, trying uselessly to push the heavy chamber right side up again, but she couldn't even lift it a little bit. In the end, she flipped over on to her back, pounding her fists on the ceiling (or rather, the back of the chamber), and yelling, praying that there was someone alive to hear her…

Her breath was coming fast, and if she'd been able to think clearly, she'd know that she was using up the air in her small chamber quickly, and that she was going to suffocate if she didn't calm down. Thinking clearly, however, was far from her mind. The only clear thought getting through was that she had to get out of the box right this fucking instant! Just when she was starting to give up on somebody hearing her, there was a scraping sound, directly to the left of her ear. Turning so that now she was back facing the ground, she turned her head, calling out.

"Hello? Hello! Is somebody there! I'm in the box – woah!" Just as she was finishing off her plea for aid, her box suddenly flipped right side up, sending her backwards into the ceiling of the chamber with a thump. She suppressed a groan, covering her eyes as light blinded her temporarily, and so it was that whatever hand pulled the lever on the outside of her box went unseen. By the time she sat up out of the newly opened box, there was nobody around her, leaving her confused as to who had freed her from her prison.

Once she was sure that none of her limbs were broken, she carefully crawled out of the chamber, tripping on the edge on her way out and nearly sprawling on to her face. Catching herself at the last second, she grabbed on to one of the few beams that were still intact for balance, and looked around. She could hear voices; calling out to one another, trying to find loved ones and friends through the unholy mess that was the passenger compartment.

Where there had been at least forty or fifty cryogenic compartments before, there were now only somewhere between ten and twenty left intact and still in the ship. The rest had obviously gone flying out when the side and rear of the ship had been ripped away. The only reason her own compartment had remained in the ship appeared to be that it had caught on to a beam or another chamber or something of the like.

Finally stopping her legs from shaking uncontrollably, she moved slowly forward, side-stepping sharp pieces of metal and debris, her eyes wide as she surveyed the damage. What the hell had happened that could down a ship so easily? More importantly, where were they? Climbing over a beam, she found herself amidst a surreally quiet chaos. A young woman around her age seemed to be searching for her partner; a man named Zeke. She had seen the two of them come in together, obviously new settlers, on their way to New Mecca she supposed.  
Stepping forward to help her, she slipped and fell slightly, finding herself face to face with said Zeke, obviously trying to reach his emergency release lever to get out of the chamber and go reassure the woman. She could hear him calling out her name (Shazza), trying to get out. Crawling, she found the lever on the outside and yanked it, causing the door to open and him to roll out.

"Here! Over here!" She called, waving her hand at Shazza, and she watched the two embrace each other, obviously glad that they had both survived relatively unscathed, and smiled lightly. How sweet that was. Continuing silently on her way, she found herself face to face with him. The merc, Johns, and he looked back at her and frowned, and she saw the puzzlement in his eyes. He recognised her face. Smiling idly, she moved past him quickly, but she could feel his eyes on her back, before he moved on, probably looking for Riddick.

As she continued on, she realised why he would be looking for Riddick here instead of assuming he had died in the crash. Riddick's cryo-chamber (and it could only be Riddick's, seeing as it had large letters spelling out 'Lockout Protocol. No Early Release' on the front) was sitting right-side up, but the convict was no where to be seen. Obviously used the crash as an opportunity to escape. Just as she was wondering this, she heard a loud commotion from somewhere to her left, and she pushed aside some crates to see Riddick and Johns engaged in mortal combat.  
Riddick was clinging to the tubes up above, and had his chained feet wrapped around Johns' neck, trying to strangle him, while Johns was swinging at him with a whip-like metal object. Riddick obviously had the upper hand, and she slunk back out of the way, in case Johns should see her and wonder why she wasn't trying to help. Just when she was sure Riddick was going to win, the tubes he had been clinging to broke, and he fell backwards, bouncing off of things with sickening thuds before falling to the floor motionless.

Johns said something to him that she couldn't hear, and she watched as he proceeded to handcuff Riddick to a beam, which was probably incredibly uncomfortable, with both his shoulders twisted backwards. Meanwhile, Carolyn was digging through the remains of the flight deck, obviously looking for Owens, and Shazza was torching some chamber, releasing a child who looked to be only around twelve or thirteen, unscathed and not even afraid. It certainly made her feel stupid, to have been panicking inside her own chamber. Which reminded her of the fact that she still did not know who had released her from that prison.

There was suddenly a commotion and everyone was gathering on the flight deck. Following along, she gasped as a hellish vision came into sight. Owens, though still alive, was lying on his back, with a long metal pole shoved directly through his chest. How the hell he was still alive was a mystery to her, but the fact was that he was screaming nonsense and obviously in intense pain. Carolyn seemed at a loss for a moment, then looked towards the group gathered around her, trying to give her advice. There were cries of "Pull it out! Just pull it out!" and "No, it's too close to his heart…" among other things, making it very confusing.

"There's some Anestaphine in the med-lock at the back of the cabin!" Carolyn said finally, and Alicia knew that there was no way that Owens could live. Carolyn just wanted to ease his passage into death with drugs to numb the pain. They all turned, however, and now it was obvious…there was no more med-lock. There was barely any cabin left. It was an older gentleman with glasses and a lot of expensive looking robes that stated the obvious to the rest of them.

"Not any more there's not." They all looked at him, then over at Carolyn, who had a look of silent despair in her eyes. Looking at Owens' face, which was sweaty and delirious with pain, she quietly ordered the rest of them to leave. Alicia looked around, then turned and started climbing over things, going out the door on to the planet which they had been condemned on to. Looking around, all she could see in all directions was miles and miles of hot, burning sands. The air shimmered with heat, and she looked up at the sky, in which there were two suns, one yellow and one bright red. No wonder it was so hot. Trying to breathe was difficult the second she stepped out, and she turned to stand back in the shade that the ship offered. Off to one side, she could hear Arabic voices chanting, and could see an older man and his three students chanting, facing each other and praying.

Standing in the doorway, she turned her head and she could see Riddick, still blindfolded and still with a bit in his mouth. Shaking her head in disgust, she considered going and at least taking out the bit, but the second she moved, she found her shoulder grabbed extremely tightly. Turned around, she found herself looking up into the face of Johns. Fuck, he knows who I am! She thought irrationally, her eyes wide, as there was what felt like a long second of silence between the two.

"Wouldn't go back there if I were you. He's an escaped convict…on his way to a triple max slam to pay for all the murders he's committed…He's right dangerous." Johns said finally, releasing the hold on her shoulder, and she glanced over her shoulder as if curious, breathing a short sigh of relief. He had no idea who she was…he was just keeping his bounty safe so that he would get full pay when the time came. If the time came. "What's your name, anyway?"

"Sara." Alicia answered smoothly, without batting an eye, amazed at her own lack of shakes. This was the first time she'd actually personally lied about who she was, and it was difficult to do without fear that she would be discovered. "Sara Aicila, English teacher and collector of interesting things, neither of which does me any good here." Holding out her hand to be shaken, Johns looked at it for a moment, then slowly shook it, smiling, probably with the dim thought that he was impressing her somehow.

"Johns. Just call me Johns." Nodding, she let go of his hand, and turned, exiting the cargo area, and climbing up on top of the ship with the others, before letting out a hiss of air, and absently wiping her hand on her pants. Egotistical jackass. She had pulled up her hood again, both to shield herself from prying eyes and to hopefully keep some of the sun off of her, and she gasped as she looked out at the field of destruction that stretched for miles behind the ship. There were overturned and burned cryogenic compartments strewn all along the deep groove that the ship had dug into the ground, and smoke and steam rose up from unseen fires. Shaking her head, she took a seat on the ship, looking out at the field for what seemed like a long time, until she heard Fry climbing up. Turning in her spot, she looked out at her for a few moments, then back at the destruction in front of her. It was insane. One moment, she had been confident, on her way to New Mecca where she could fade from existence, and now they had crash-landed on some planet spawned of Hell and neither she nor Riddick had escaped, not that there was anywhere to escape to.

Fry was trying to explain what might have happened to down the ship, giving the possibilities of a meteor shower or perhaps a rogue comet, and then, defeated, said that she didn't know for sure. Shazza shook her head, looking out at the destruction, before piping up.

"Well, I for one am thoroughly grateful." Shazza was standing close to her partner, Zeke, nearly touching but not quite, and turned to Fry with a smile on her face. "The beast wasn't meant to land like this…but I think you did well. It's pretty much thanks to her that we're still alive, really." Those around her echoed the sentiments, patting Fry on the shoulder and thanking her. Even Alicia stood up and gently patted her right shoulder, smiling and nodding her thanks.

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A few hours later, they were all down in the tipsy-turvy cargo hold, with Alicia (a.k.a Sara) sitting in one corner, inwardly cursing as she watched everybody shifting through what was left of their luggage. Her one suitcase had disappeared entirely, including the gun, so she was basically just watching everybody else. Paris was in the middle of unlocking a chain that was wrapped over a case that looked like it was a mummy's tomb or something of the like. Half-expecting to see a rotting mummy when he opened it, she was pleasantly surprised, and moved forward when there was revealed a great amount of bottles of alcohol. Picking one up, she paused, looking at it with a frown. Something about the drink…reminded her of something. Shrugging it off, she popped it open and took a long swig, relishing the cold liquid sliding down her throat.

As the rest of the crew discussed the possibility of going to search for water, Alicia slid out of sight carefully, then, once she was sure that Johns was busy, sprinted across the hot sand back towards the ship, still clutching the almost completely full bottle in her right hand. Sliding mercifully into the relative coolness of the shady ship's interior, she slowed down, and paused, looking at Riddick from the back. The way he was sitting was obviously uncomfortable, and she felt bad for him, but she knew that nobody would believe that if she tried to help him out. She might get in trouble just from what she was about to do.

The room was silent other than each of their breathing, and then slowly she moved down the makeshift hall, her feet making hollow thudding sounds against the metal. Riddick still hadn't reacted, even as she stopped in front of him, and she stood, looking down, uncertain what she was doing. Finally, she kneeled, and reached forward, gently removing the bit from his mouth. Before she could speak, he spoke for her.

"Well, well, well…we meet again…Alicia," Quickly looking around to make sure nobody had heard him using her proper name, she opened her mouth to shush him before he blew her cover, but again he spoke before she could respond. "It wasn't that long ago that I first made your acquaintance, it seems…it also seems that the meeting did not result in much good stuff for you, did it? Last I heard, you had yourself a bounty over your head, just for helping me out of a jam. How interesting that one can be killed for helping another human…very interesting…." There was silence for a few seconds, and then Alicia spoke.

"I brought you something to drink. It's not water; they haven't found any yet, its some kind of alcohol. Here, open your mouth…." Leaning forward a bit, she held the bottle to his slightly open mouth and tipped the bottle up slightly, letting the liquid flow slowly into his mouth. "And yeah, what you've said is a fucking understatement…my life's a mess now, because of you." Pulling the bottle back, she took a sip herself, and watched as he took his time swishing the liquid around his mouth and then swallowing it. Although he was blindfolded, she had the oddest feeling, as if he could see her despite of it.

"Oh, I wouldn't say that…it could be worse." He put in what felt like a long pause there, and she waited for him to explain how it could possibly be worse, and he lovingly supplied the information. "You could be dead." Swallowing nervously, she took another swig of her drink, and stood up, looking down at him.

"Compared to a lifetime of hiding, I don't think death would have been that bad." She said, more to herself than to him, and she popped the top back on to the bottle defiantly, though she had not given him much of a drink. "Your welcome." She said, sarcastically, since he had yet to thank her for bringing him the drink the first place. With that, she turned and started to walk away, forgetting about replacing the bit.

"I said I wouldn't forget." She stopped short, and heard him shifting behind her for a moment, and if she'd looked, she would have seen an almost amused half-smile on his face. There was no response, but she hadn't left yet. It wasn't until a few more seconds had passed, and then he finally heard her footsteps hurriedly retreating, and he smiled. He had shaken her nerves. Turning his head a bit, he looked up through a hole in the blindfold, and spotted a break in the beam he was handcuffed to. How useful…

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Alicia exited not a moment too soon, still clutching her alcohol in her right hand, staring across the desert. 'I said I wouldn't forget'. What does he mean by that? Is he trying to make me confused? Shaking her head, she walked across the hot sands, towards the rest of the group, who were still discussing who would go searching for water, and who would stay at the ship guarding.

Nobody knew Riddick was gone until Johns came running up, cursing violently, and saying that Riddick had somehow got away. He had found his restraints heading towards sunset, which was fast approaching. Finally, some reprieve from the heat. Just as they were all getting themselves weapons (ironically, Alicia ended up with the very gun she'd thought was lost), Paris came running up, breathing heavily.

"Excuse me!" He said, and everybody looked up to see what he wanted, as well as Alicia, who was loading up her gun gingerly. Although she had packed the gun in case of an emergency, she had never fired the damn thing, nor did she know how. "I think you should see this."

Alicia gasped as she rounded the corner of the ship, staring at the horizon, which was revealing the presence of yet another sun. Three suns. No nightfall, just constantly revolving suns, their heat threatening to drown her in sweat. All of the other's reactions were similar, with gasps and curses. Sighing, Alicia looked down at the gun in her hands, before sliding it into her pocket. She took a quick suck on her oxygen, having been feeling short of breath again. She, along with Paris, Jack, Shazza, and Zeke, were to remain at the ship, keeping an eye out for Riddick, and to look for anything salvageable in the ship.

Alicia watched as the rest of the crew disappeared over a rise, vanishing from sight, then jumped down from the ship to where Zeke was loading the dead bodies of Owens and the captain on to a makeshift sled, to go and bury them. Alicia had requested that she aid him in burying the bodies, because other than that she had nothing useful she could do, and the feeling of usefulness was…unpleasant. By now everything had obtained a bluish tinge, as the yellow and red suns disappeared below the horizon and the newly risen blue sun took over the sky. As she took one side of the harness that was to drag the sled along, she looked up and saw that Paris had got very comfortable very quickly, and she couldn't help but glare at him sourly. He was smoking a cigar and drinking his expensive alcohol, sitting in a lawn chair, and beneath an umbrella.

"You comfy up there?" Zeke called out sourly, in a heavy Australian accent. Zeke himself was a young man, with obvious Aboriginal background, though the heavy accent showed that it was not a direct relation that was the source of it. His hair showed a bit of grey in it already, and his body was heavily built, strong. She wouldn't go against him in a fight.

"Yes, well, it's amazing how you can do without the necessities of life, provided you have the little luxuries." Paris said with a smile, taking a puff of his cigar. Paris didn't seem the least bit disturbed at the sour tempers directed his way while others worked hard. After all, he was the metaphorical watchdog, making sure that Riddick didn't sneak up on any of them. Even if all that meant was that he had to sit on a lawn chair and relax. He was an older man with gold-rimmed glasses, probably in his forties, dressed in expensive looking cloths and velvets, and was obviously not at all used to labour or work. Which made her wonder why he had taken the cheapest flights available to get wherever he was off to. Perhaps he just didn't want to be too far from his precious antiquities.

"Well, just keep your bloody eyes open. I don't want that dog sneakin' up on our bloody asses." Alicia nodded in agreement, as she hoisted up her end of the sled, and they both dragged the cloth-wrapped bodies towards where they were going to bury them, near the spires that loomed up like the jagged teeth of some sleeping demon. Handing Zeke a pick, they began working together to dig a hole in the ground, and soon both of them were sucking greedily at their breathers, and sweating bullets. Though she hadn't known either of the officers they were burying, she just kept reminding herself that every person deserved a proper burial.

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Time passed slowly, but after an hour or so they were at least three or four feet below the surface, though they were still digging constantly, needing to get it deeper and wider so as to accommodate both of the bodies. Suddenly, Zeke stopped, and she assumed it was to catch his breath, but then he unhooked the gun that Johns had given him and had dropped the pick to the ground. Stopping, she took a deep inhale of her own breather, pushing her glasses up from where they'd fallen down her sweat-soaked nose.

"What? What is it?" Zeke glanced down at her, and bit his lip, seemingly uncertain. "Well…? Did you hear something?" Alicia was not afraid of Riddick…okay, that was a lie, she was deeply afraid of Riddick, but she also knew…somehow…that he wouldn't kill unless he had a very, very good reason. She hoped so, anyhow...

"I dunno…just a feelin'…wait 'ere." With that, he climbed up out of the trench, and disappeared. Sighing, she shook her head, and turned, continuing to dig. Her dark blonde hair was matted and sweaty, and she was wishing more than ever that it was still the raven-colour it had been originally. She couldn't believe that her contacts had remained in her eye with all the dust and dryness here, and she was worried they would come out soon...her extras had been in her suitcase, which had disappeared. Shazza had lent her a hair tie, and she'd pulled back her hair so that it was out of her face, but some of it was coming loose, falling in her eyes, and she paused to fix it. That was when she heard it. An odd clicking sound, as if somebody were repeatedly trying to flick a lighter into life, and failing. Looking around, wondering if perhaps Paris had come around and was trying to light his cigar, she frowned.

"That's weird…." She muttered to herself as she clambered out of the trench. She found that she was alone, and the clicking sound had ceased. Very weird…Shaking her head, she had turned to return to digging when suddenly there were gunshots echoing off the spires around her. Three, in quick succession. Turning in surprise, she started to run across the sand, her breather falling off and clattering to the ground. Had they seen Riddick? As she arrived, breathless, back at the ship, she found Zeke and the others all gathered around a dead stranger, and Zeke was cursing violently. He'd thought the silhouette had been Riddick, and that he'd been about to attack and kill the others. As she looked around with a sigh, disgusted by the amount of blood on the ground and splattered on Shazza, her eyes fell on where Paris had been sitting, and she had to stifle a gasp. There was Riddick, calmly seated in Paris' chair, drinking some of his alcohol. Sly devil.

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With now another body to bury, Zeke and Alicia dragged it back along on the sled, back towards the grave. By now Alicia was almost dying, short of breath and drenched in sweat. She had long ago discarded her cloak, knowing that if she hadn't, she would've died of heat stroke, so now she was in jeans and a very tight black T-shirt, the bottom of which she had tied up to try and cool herself off. It hadn't helped much. As they arrived back at the grave, they paused, and Zeke pulled the tarp back. They both looked down in surprise, for there was a small tunnel that had appeared at one end of the trench, and Zeke looked at Alicia as if she could explain it.

"That's weird…I didn't do that. I only got a few more swings in with the pick before your gunshots scared the fuck out of me and I went running to see what that was about…." Remembering that her breather had fallen off around some nearby spires, she glanced back, spotting it glinting in the blue sunlight. "I'll be right back, I dropped my breather over there…" Turning, she heard Zeke drop down into the trench, probably to investigate that hole. Jogging over to her breather, she happily picked it up and took a long inhale of the pure oxygen, and exhaled slowly. That felt a bit better, anyhow.

As she turned to return to the trench, she screamed as gunshots echoed from the trench, along with Zeke's yells of agony. Once again forgetting the breather, she ran, the breather falling from her shoulder to the ground with a dull clattering sound, and she leaped down into the trench without a thought, only to find all the walls splattered with the surreal crimson red of blood. "Oh my god…." Leaning down, she thought perhaps Zeke had disappeared down the hole, or at least been shoved down there by whatever had killed him. Oh don't sugar coat it with 'whatevers'. You know who must have killed him, you just don't want to say it. Riddick. Who else is there on this rock? 

Just as she was turning around, having heard the sounds of Shazza running to Zeke's aid, something slashed out and wrapped around her ankle, yanking her with a thump and a cry to the ground, and then it started pulling her…into the hole. Screaming, her hands clawed uselessly at the ground and her legs kicked out at whatever held her capture. She could feel something biting and clawing at her legs, and pain flashed through her like red-hot flames. Just as she was about to lose what grip she had got on the wall of the trench, a dark figure leaped down and grabbed her wrists, and for a long moment it felt like she was the rope in an insane, nightmarish game of tug of war. Then there was a low growl, and something whistled past her head, and there was a demonic wail of pain from in the hole, and the grip on her ankles was released, and she was dragged back into the light.

Still crying with fear, she was pushed to the ground on her back, and she found herself looking up into black goggles that she recognised, reflecting her own shocked and terrified face back at her. In the upside down universe that this was, she had been rescued from death by the deliverer of death…Richard B. Riddick. In one hand he held what appeared to be a home made shiv, made out of what looked like bone, though it was bloodless. Considering how her legs were cut-up, and the way he had her pinned to the ground (although the reason for this she did not know), it did not look good for Riddick.

There was a gasp from up above, and both of them looked up to see Shazza, befalling this image with eyes who did not know what had happened before. There was a millisecond of shock for all three, then Riddick released her, and sprang up out of the hole, charging off among the spires. Staring at the hole in front of her, Alicia thought she could still hear the clicking, taunting her…then she ran for it, pain in her legs overruled by pure, blind fear of what was in that hole.

((Voila. Chapter number 3. Fun, huh? I love writing this stuff…I'll be a bit longer getting Chapter 4 up, because I have to work on my online school work. You guys understand, right? Of course you do. See you all soon!))


	4. Monsters

((And now for Chapter 4! Wow, I've never updated this fast before…I'm so proud of myself. :) Alright, I'm going to start writing now…and see how my inspiration takes me…OOH, before I forget. THANKS TO ALL MY REVIEWERS. You guys rock my socks. You all get huggles. –huggles-))

Alicia had not stopped running until she'd reached the ship, ignorant of the capture and beating of Riddick that was going on behind her. Her breather was left behind in the dust, and she found herself sucking for air that wouldn't come as she leaned against the ship, wavering back and forth, dizzy, still bleeding openly. Paris and Jack had been the only ones still at the ship by that point, and they rushed out, steadying her as she tried to breathe with lungs aching from running with no breather. Paris quickly handed her his breather, which she sucked on quickly, feeling the dizziness abating slightly.

Carolyn and the rest had returned in a few minutes, with Johns dragging the unconscious Riddick into the ship, and their main concerns were to try and stop the bleeding on the cuts, none of which were very deep. Although only half-conscious of the going-ons around her, she heard them discussing about where the bandages were, and someone sent Jack searching for the emergency med-kit, which was supposedly somewhere in the flight cabin, which was for the most part intact.

"Something in the hole." Alicia said finally, but nobody was listening, her voice was too quiet to be heard over the hustle and bustle as bandages were found, and taped overtop of the worst of the cuts. Most of the other cuts had stopped bleeding on their own, they were shallow. Her jeans had saved her from the worst of it, though they were now shredded beyond repair, making them more into jean shorts than normal jeans. From the way it looked, if the jeans hadn't been there, her entire leg might have been just sliced off.

Eventually the pain subsided from hot flashes to a dull ache, and then finally to just a stinging every now and then. Alicia stood up on her own, a bit wobbly but otherwise fine, and looked down, realising one of her tough walking shoes had been nearly shredded to the skin. In one section only a very thin layer remained between whatever had been attacking her and her foot. The foot that she'd been kicking with had remained almost totally unharmed, though the leg had received a great many scratches and cuts from things slashing at her. Heading towards where Riddick was being held, she had a great many things she needed to say to him, but Imam and his students headed her off. They were requesting she attend a prayer session for Zeke.  
Alicia did believe in God, for what else could be saving her from so many tragedies thus far? Even so, it was awkward, because she didn't understand what the Arabic's were saying. Shazza was there, as was Paris and Jack, and none of them had any idea what they were saying. That was some comfort at least. Shazza had obviously been crying, and was still doing so. Alicia could see that she and Zeke had been close, and couldn't help a weak feeling of guilt that she hadn't been able to save him.

After the service, Alicia found herself propelling her feet towards where Riddick was being kept. Walking in, she stopped, seeing that Carolyn was there, speaking with him. Riddick's goggles had been taken, and his eyes were closed. His wrists were connected in a complicated chain system that allowed no way for his considerable talent for dislocating joints to get him out of it.  
"Show me your eyes, Riddick." Carolyn was saying, and Alicia saw Riddick smirk, and beckon her closer. What surprised her was when Carolyn actually moved closer. Those chains obviously gave her a sense of security. With all the good will in the world, Alicia wouldn't have moved any closer to that man unless she was sure beyond a shadow of a doubt that there was no way he could do anything to her. Riddick apparently didn't think that Carolyn was close enough, because he beckoned her even closer. Again, Carolyn moved slowly closer, then gave a startled gasp as suddenly Riddick lunged forward, his face only a few inches away from Carolyn's. His eyes were wide open, shining in the dark like two identical jewels.

"Where the hell can I get eyes like that?" Alicia and Carolyn both turned their heads, where Jack was standing on the stairs, looking on with fascination. Riddick didn't move his eyes from Carolyn, though she thought she saw them flicker over at her for the briefest instant when Carolyn looked away.

"Gotta kill a few people." Riddick said, as if he were relating on how to do a math problem, or talking about the weather. Jack said, without hesitation, that she could do that. "Then you gotta get sent to the slam…where they tell ya you'll never see daylight again. You dig up a doctor. Pay him 20 Menthol Kools to do a surgical shine job on your eyeballs." All of this was said with the utmost calm, and Alicia inched forward, fascinated. She had heard hundreds of rumours as to why Riddick's eyes glowed like they did, and of course she knew that he could see in the dark because of it, but to hear the truth straight from his lips was fascinating.

"So you can see who's sneaking up on you in the dark?" Jack said slyly, and Carolyn ordered her to leave. First harshly, then more gently, having not meant to be nasty. Obviously Carolyn did not want the child influenced by the 'cold-hearted criminal', and Alicia was not all that surprised. As soon as Jack was gone, Carolyn turned back to Riddick, who was sitting down again.  
"So what was your plan, Riddick? You were just going to kill Zeke, then run for it, right? Then Sara showed up, and spoiled your plan. So you were aiming to kill her too. But she fought back, is that it?" Carolyn spoke nastily, glaring at Riddick, and Alicia was staring at the back of Carolyn's head as if there was a foot growing out of it. What was she babbling on about? "She went for the hole, hoping for protection, but you pulled her back out, and you were about to stab her, when Shazza showed up and scared you away."

Riddick started to laugh. Alicia turned her 'foot-growing-in-back-of-head' gaze from Carolyn to Riddick, wondering how someone could laugh when they were being accused of a murder that they knew they hadn't committed. It wasn't cheerful laughter, it was loud mocking laughter, and she could see Carolyn looking unnerved at this. Alicia inched forward more, watching curiously.

"For one thing, just because somebody showed up on the scene would not scare me away from killing someone if I want to kill them. Two...why don't you ask Sara herself what happened?" Riddick had stopped looking at Carolyn, and had moved his gaze over her shoulder, right at her. Carolyn turned around, and looked at her in surprise, then seemed strengthened. Alicia moved forward uncertainly, her eyes on Riddick and Riddick alone, who was watching her constantly, eyes gleaming in the dark, no emotion but perhaps cold amusement present on his face. Carolyn watched her, obviously seeing the pointlessness of repeating the question.

"I was…I was getting my breather, because I'd dropped it. I heard Zeke yelling, like something was…attacking him, and there were gunshots…" Alicia paused, thinking about every detail, her eyes downcast, feeling two pairs of eyes looking right at her, boring holes through her brain. "I jumped down into the trench, and there…there was blood, everywhere. I thought that maybe Zeke was in the hole, so I leaned down to look, but I didn't see anything. I heard Shazza coming, so I turned around, and something…something grabbed my ankle. It pulled me down, tried to pull me into the hole…and then…somebody grabbed my wrists, and pulled me back out just before I lost my grip on the walls…." Here she paused, and looked up at Riddick, who was now looking at Carolyn, who had a 'you've got to me fucking with me' look on her face.

"What do you mean 'something' pulled you down? Didn't you see what it was?" Alicia shook her head, looking at Riddick still, and Carolyn looked back at him. Alicia had the feeling that Carolyn didn't believe a word of what she was saying, probably thinking that Riddick was intimidating her into lying. Carolyn lowered her voice, turning to Alicia. "You don't have to be scared of him, he can't –"

"Did I kill a few people? Mauled a few, even?" Riddick was speaking again, as if Carolyn hadn't even started, and both of them turned their heads towards him, his muscles taut as they were forced to stretch outward by the chains. "Sure. Did I kill Zeke? No. Cut up Sara's legs there? Nope. You got the wrong killer." Sara shifted awkwardly; conscious of the bandages that covered her legs like big beacons saying that she was weak. The second she got the chance, she was ripping the damn things off.

"Look, he's not in the hole. We looked." Carolyn said, obviously fed up, perhaps wondering if Riddick could brainwash her into telling lies. There was a millisecond of dead silence, and then Riddick spoke in his low, rumbling voice that sent shivers down her spine.

"Look deeper."  
________________________________________  
"If the tunnel gets smaller further down, we'll need somebody small to go through. Us men are too big. That leaves Sara, Carolyn, and Shazza. Which one of you is smaller?" Johns looked at the three of them, and Alicia glanced at the other two, and saw that it was obvious who was the smaller of the two, and panic filled her face.

"No. No fucking way, I'm not going down that hole." Alicia was watching the hole with an air of anxiety, obviously uncomfortable even being within five feet of that hole. "I don't think anybody else should either, there's something down there…I don't know what the fuck it is, but it's dangerous." Carolyn shook her head, and moved forward, taking the clip from Imam's hand and clipping it to her belt. They didn't believe her. Thought she was lying because she was afraid of Riddick.

One of her brown contact lenses had come out as they were walking over to the hole again, so she'd been forced to discreetly remove the other one as well, so her eyes were now their normal bright green. Luckily she had her hood up again, and nobody had really noticed the colour of her eyes…she hoped. Carolyn disappeared down the hole, and all that could be seen was the rope, leading from its secure position in Imam's hand down into the darkness. Alicia was afraid, anxious just being anywhere near the hole (that she was certain was a direct passageway to Hell). Although the clicking had not started up again, even if it had, she would have been more prepared for it.

A little time passed, and then she was sure she could hear yelling, from deep within the hole. Jack was also looking around, as if he too could hear something, and Imam moved closer to the hole, stating that he'd thought he'd heard something. Suddenly they all came to the conclusion. She was inside one of the spires. Nobody would ever be quite able to remember who heard her first, or who swung the pickaxe that let her out. The second she was crouching on the ground, swearing profusely, Alicia knew that she believed her now. Oh yes, she most certainly believed her now.

"Fuck! Fuck, we're so…so stupid!" Carolyn shook her head, looking at Shazza, who had asked if she'd found Zeke. "I don't know…what the fuck is down there…but it got Zeke, went for Sara, and nearly got ME!" She screamed as the cable, which was still down the hole, suddenly went taut, ripping her backwards, back into the hole. Everybody grabbed at her, and somebody finally managed to cut the rope. Looking down, Alicia could see something shoot after the rope as it fell, and shivered subconsciously. She'd warned them, and it should have been a 'I told you so' situation…but she refrained, deciding that Carolyn was too shaken up at the moment.

Although nobody knew what was down there, the spires were placed off-limits for everybody (this was mainly put in for Jack, the only one with enough bravado to boast how he could go down there and fight those things). Eventually Alicia learned what had been found while they were exploring earlier, and a bit of hope filled her. There was a skiff, and that meant a way off of this god-forsaken hellhole of a planet. With newly renewed fervour, Alicia helped everybody pack up things, and carried one of Paris' bags, seeing as he had more than he could carry, and they started off.

Riddick had made a deal with Johns, and so he had been walking at the back of the line, without chains or bit, practically a pack mule as he dragged along extra things, and obviously nobody thought him human enough to supply him with a breather. Letting herself slowly fall behind, she finally was standing just in front of him. Pulling her breather off of her shoulder, she discreetly let it fall to the ground, without stopping. Without turning her head, she could hear Riddick pause, pick up the breather from the ground, and loop it over his own shoulder, taking a long breath of it. Although it would never repay him for saving her life, it was a good start.

By the time they got to the settlement, the blue sun had set, and the red and yellow suns had risen again. Not even a second of darkness had been rewarded, and Alicia sighed, dumping the stuff she'd been carrying wherever Paris had wanted her to, and then, seeing as she was useless with mechanics, told everyone (though nobody really heard her) that she was going to go look for anything useful.

Inside the various buildings, she could see that there was a settlement here, with children, families…there were pictures on the walls, clothes on the hanger. Why had they left without their things? By now, Alicia was beginning to be short of breath, having left the breather with Riddick still. Oh well, he probably needed it more than she did. Approaching the final building, she pulled on the doors, but found that it was locked. Frowning, she rubbed at the windows, peering in, but couldn't see anything through them, the dirt and grime were too crusted to be wiped away. Reaching up, she pushed aside a tarp, reading the name: Coring Room. Interesting.

"Do you see it now? What happened to these people?" Alicia jumped and whirled around, back pressed to the doors, finding that Riddick was not only behind her, but only a few feet behind her. He'd obviously come up as she was looking through the windows. Alicia looked at him, his goggles still in place on his head, her breather over his shoulder, and shrugged awkwardly. Moving forward, slowly, he leaned down, pulling what looked like broken eyeglasses from the dust by her feet, and she looked at them with wide eyes. "Or are you as blind as the others?"

"They're dead." Alicia whispered, finding that she was dead certain of this, remembering the pictures on the wall, and the clothes still hanging on the hooks. An emergency ship prepped and ready. Who prepped their emergency ship…unless there was an emergency? Riddick nodded, leaning his forearm against the door by her head, towering over her. "The things in the hole…they were here too…they killed them…." Riddick nodded again, and he was even closer than before, invading her personal space, but he had given lots of room for her to leave. The option was there, unspoken of, but she found that she couldn't move, as if the door of the Coring Room was made of glue, sticking her to it inescapably.

"Why did you save me?" Alicia had found this question had been burning in her conscious for a long while, and now it had been blurted out before she had a chance to think about it. Riddick smiled at that, as if he'd been expecting that question all along.

"Why?" Riddick moved even closer, his face inches away from hers, his breath warm against her skin. For a few unexplainably long moments, there was silence, and she could feel her heart quickening against her chest. Then the moment was sliced in two, by the sound of a clearing throat. Riddick didn't turn his head, but Alicia moved hers slightly to see past him. Johns was standing there, glaring at his back. "Repaying a debt." Riddick whispered into her ear, then he turned and headed off, yanking down the tarp as he went by, revealing a curiously spying Jack, who had shaved his head and made make-shift goggles.

Johns hadn't moved, even as Riddick walked by, but once he was passed, he moved forward, looking at her. Blinking, she moved forward a bit, and Jack walked past the two of them as well. Alicia turned to go past him, but he grabbed her arm, stopping her, and she looked at him, eyes wide, and he smiled an odd smile. She had rolled her shirtsleeves up so that it was now a tank top, with the bottom tied up as well, and she had seen Johns looking at her strangely. She'd thought it was because he recognised her face…being a bounty hunter, he had probably memorised every convict with a bounty on his or her head across the universe. Now she was beginning to remember the facts of life that she'd forgotten while in hiding.

"You're a right pretty woman, Sara…would be a shame to see your throat slit…" This was apparently supposed to be making her attracted to him, and she raised an eyebrow, pulling her arm away. "I can protect you from big, bad and ugly over there…all night…." At this, she took a big step back, pulling her wrist away from his grip, and she backed away, but found herself stuck, once again, against the doors of the Coring Room, with no where to run. Johns was now standing exactly where Riddick had been, except he placed both his hands on either side of her, preventing her from running.

"Yes, it would be a real shame…." Johns said, looking her over totally and obviously, and she considered screaming. Then remembered the big-ass gun that sat on Johns' hip. Fuck. Just when he was lowering his face towards hers, there was the sound of a scream from within the building, drawing Johns' attention up to window. Using the distraction, she shoved his arm out of the way and fled, feet sending up dust. Halfway there, she ran into the other survivors, all of them going to investigate the scream. Meanwhile, Johns was covering up his indiscretion by raising his gun and blasting in the locks on the doors, as if that was why he was down there the entire time.

Alicia was about to go forward into the room, when a hand grabbed her wrist. Turning her head, she found herself face to face with her own reflection, in those ever-present black goggles. Riddick slowly shook his head, then let go of her wrist, going in ahead. Blinking, she paused, then followed, hanging out in the doorway with everyone. Imam was walking around, calling out the name of one of his younger students; a young boy named Ali. Suddenly there was a loud screeching, and a cloud of black creatures came shooting out of a cupboard, whistling around the room with an unholy screeching, like the very bats of hell. Johns pushed everyone back and slammed the door as they went flying past, then slowly slid back out, watching as they all went screeching down a big hole in the centre of the room.

Just as they were calming down, calling out to Imam to make sure he wasn't injured, the desecrated body of Ali came tumbling out of the cupboard, the eyes gouged out, the face reduced to something resembling chopped meat. It took all of Alicia's willpower not to vomit what little food she had eaten. Even so, she quickly exited the room, leaning against the wall, her eyes closed. Those flying screeching things…the creature that had tried to take her from life had been much, much bigger than those. That meant that those were probably hatchlings. That meant that they had a lot to be afraid of. Looking down at her legs, she leaned down, and with a harsh yank, ripped off the bandages that covered her legs, with a fervour she couldn't comprehend. Her legs were harshly red and scabbed, but she didn't care. Then she looked up at Johns, who was watching her with a curious look. Backing off, she turned and walked away, with the thought that it had been at least two days since they'd crashed, and she hadn't had any sleep…

________________________________________  
Using one of the beds that were left over from the settlement, Alicia settled in, closing all the blinders, shielding the room in an artificial night. Carolyn and the others had remained to investigate the Coring Room, but Carolyn had almost ordered her to go rest. Saying she'd been through a traumatic day, what with the creatures in the hole, and that she needed to be at her top form to help them out in any case. The others had apparently rested already, taking turns, and it was now her turn in any case.

Letting her green eyes roam the room, they settled on the pictures on one shelf. They showed a little boy playing with a little toy robot and a young man with glasses (the glasses Riddick had showed her came to mind) as well as a young woman smiling broadly. A happy family. The frame was cracked, as if somebody had dropped it, and then it had been replaced on the shelf, and she sighed, rolling over so that she was facing away from it. What had been going through their minds as they'd sat, in the dark, unaware that the danger was not outside, but beneath them? Who had been the first to go? Had the parents died protecting her children, or had the children been snatched away because they weren't fast enough to run?

Closing her eyes, the tiny streams of light beneath the window move slowly across the floor, shifting between asleep and awake. The lights changed from yellowish red to blue, and then slowly began to change back to yellow. Her eyes slid open lazily again, and, having been sleeping a long while it seemed now, she rolled back over. Only to come face to face with identical cat-like eyes, watching her from a dark corner. She had to stifle a scream of surprise, and jumped so badly that she actually tumbled off the other side of the bed in a tangled heap of blankets. From the corner, she could hear light, low laughter, and she scrambled back up to a standing position, watching the eyes as they gleamed at her.

"Do you ever announce your presence?" Alicia asked, frustrated at having been scared so many times by him. Although in the dark she couldn't see any of his face or body, the twin jewels that were his eyes were bright enough to indicate where he was in the room. Every so often, they would vanish as he blinked, then quickly re-appear again. Riddick didn't respond for a moment, but the eyes seemed closer after one of his blinks than before, and it made her nervous that he could see her perfectly, while she was still waiting for her eyes to adjust to the lack of light.

"I was keeping watch." If she squinted, Alicia thought she could see a dim outline of his form in the darkness. Another blink. A step closer. Alicia blinked at him, raising her eyebrow. Keeping watch from what?

"From what? There's no access to underground in here." Alicia said, shaking her head as she bent down, picking up the blankets and dropping them back on the bed in a jumbled heap, turning her eyes back to where he'd been, she gasped to find that the eyes had vanished. "Riddick…?" She said hesitantly, moving a step forward in the darkness, reaching her hands forward so as to avoid running into things in the dark. There was a few seconds silence. He must have left…Alicia mused, and turned to go open up the blinders on the windows, only to walk right into the brick wall that was Riddick.

For a moment there was silence, as she looked up, able to see Riddick's face, goggle-less, and finding herself lost in those eyes. She thought, for the first time, she could see some emotion in those cold eyes. Something that wasn't hatred or anger…something different…but before she could place it, it was gone. "Not all monsters live underground…." He whispered, and then he was gone, vanishing into the darkness and a second later the piece of cloth that served as a door swished aside.

Not all monsters live underground…Alicia mused to herself as she pulled the blinders on the windows open, filling the room with a bluish light. Behind her, she heard the sound of the cloth being pushed back, and turned around, expecting to see goggled eyes again. However, she was unpleasantly surprised and more than a little uncomfortable to find Johns standing there, gun ever present on his hip. With a not-so-sincere smile, she started to move past her.

Not all monsters…She felt pressure on the small of her back, pushing her forward, too low to be considered just a friendly touch …live underground. 

((Okay, I decided to end it here. I could have made it longer, but then…I didn't. Yeah. This chapter isn't as good as the last few, and you can tell who my least favourite character is :-P Okay, I'm working on Chapter 5 as we speak. So yeah…enjoy guys!))


	5. Let There Be Dark

((-trumpets blare- Chapter 5! Yay! Sorry I didn't update for a couple days guys, I was at my friend's cottage. Okay, I may or may not change the rating on this story from M to T, just so that it shows up on the first page without people having to change what shows up…that might get more people reading it. So yeah. :) Still deciding on that point. Suggestions?))

Time was passing slowly, and how many days had passed was uncertain. Without nightfall, or even sunset, the passage of time was impossible to measure. Her brain could not relate when it was time to sleep, because of the lack of darkness, so it was that she would go probably two or three days worth without it. The fact was she wouldn't even notice how tired she was getting until it was her turn for sleep, and then she'd sit down, fully expecting a hard time falling asleep, and be out of it literally before she hit the pillow. It wasn't until she awoke that a moment of panic would set in as she remembered who could easily sneak in to her room while she slept. Every time she turned around, however, she would be greeted with the ever-watching jewels in one corner of her room, and she would be inexplicably comforted and relaxed.

Carolyn and the others were highly worried about keeping people out of the dark, though they understood the need to sleep, but their main concern was to get the skiff running. It took a long time before they were able to modify the fuel-intake to be compatible with the fuel cells from the Hunter/Gratzner. They'd need to bring five more from the ship to get it to run. Shazza was working on getting the sandcat running so that they could carry the cells on it. Imam and his two remaining students were usually in charge of collecting water and food for each of them, while Paris usually…just sat around doing nothing. Jack would either walk around trying to find ways to help, or she would follow Riddick around, mimicking his movements.

Alicia usually found herself aiding Shazza with the sandcat, which was a piece of technology that she understood how to work a little bit more than she understood the skiff or the modification of fuel cell intake valves or whatever the hell they were talking about. A few more days passed like this, and one day Alicia found herself without anything to do. She found herself inexplicably drawn to the Coring Room, almost magnetically, even though it made her nervous. Although the room was now flooded with light, bright enough to keep the creatures that lived in the downstairs away, the reminder of what had taken place both at the doors and inside left her spooked to be in there alone. On this day, however, she was there again, walking around, pushing aside debris and broken coring samples. The room was still shadowed in some places, despite the huge skylight that had opened up in the roof, and those were the places she kept away from.

The cuts on her legs were still healing, though they weren't so red and scarred as they'd been when she'd first ripped the bandages off, and you could still see them through the rips on her jeans. There weren't any other clothes, and nobody had changed at all. It hadn't been that long, perhaps a week or so at most. Alicia paused next to a shelf full of past coring samples, now reduced to dust and crumbling. About to move on, she caught a glimpse of something flashing in the pile of dust. Frowning, she shifted some dust aside, and pulled out the little card, which showed a bunch of numbers and slashes. Adjusting her glasses slightly, brushing a bit more dust away from the numbers, she pursed her lips at the date. This was the last coring sample to have been taken, obviously. 22 years ago…wow, a long time to be forgotten by the world…Putting the card in her pocket absently, Alicia continued on without a thought, and soon found herself in front of the cupboard where Ali had made his final stand. Poor kid…he didn't have a chance…

Shaking her head, Alicia continued her silent travels around the Coring Room, picking up a few things here and there and looking them over before placing them back down again. Before long, she found herself inevitably propelled next to the huge hole in the floor. Crouching, she used a chain as balance as she leaned out to look down, seeing what the others had already seen. Skeletons, dozens of them, the remains of the children and families that had been here only twenty-two years ago. As she stood up, about to leave, she paused, with the distinct feeling that something…was watching her. Riddick, of course. She realised with an amused smile, and turned around, fully expecting to be face to face with those goggles. Instead she found herself facing an empty room.

Blinking in surprise, she turned around again, taking in the full extent of the room, but it was obviously completely empty. I could have sworn…there was something there. Now with a full-on case of the jitters, she didn't waste time hurrying out of the room, and back into the direct sunlight, while behind her, deep within the hole, there was the sound of quiet skittering. It…sensed…blood. It just needed to wait…for soon the time would come.

________________________________________  
Alicia found that her travels took her into a previously unexplored section of the compound, which was dark, with the blinders shut. Moving forward, she pulled them open, and turned around as the sounds of mechanics working behind her met her ears. The sunlight had fallen directly onto a solar power generator, and three lights turned themselves on: two yellow ones next to each other, and a blue one opposite. In the middle was a small planet, which Alicia figured was the planet they were on, and revolving with the planet were two larger planets, one that looked remarkably like Saturn, with two sets of rings, and a bluish coloured one that resembled Neptune. Alicia watched curiously, vaguely keeping track of the numbers slowly ticking by, seeing that no matter how many revolutions were made, it didn't look as if there was going to be any nightfall on the planet.

Just as she was thinking this, the planet she was watching was suddenly encased in darkness. Startled, she grabbed the lever to stop the planets from revolving, and stared at the planet with wide eyes. An eclipse. A total solar eclipse. Her eyes slid to the counter below, and gasped, her fingers withdrawing the small metal card from her pocket and glancing at the date. Twenty-two years…that's what happened to them…they got stuck in the solar eclipse, and there was no where to run. The number below the model glared at her, mocking her. 22. There's going to be an eclipse…sometime soon…got to tell Carolyn, we've got to get the cells…get off this planet. 

Letting the card fall from shaking fingers, it floated gently to rest on the bottom of the model, as Alicia turned and started to run out, only to, not for the first time, smack directly into Riddick's chest, who had apparently been standing in the doorway that entire time. Looking up at him, her breath was coming fast, an edge of panic in her green eyes, glasses knocked askew. For a half-second, she forgot what was so urgent that she was running, then she remembered.

"An eclipse." She whispered, hoping that Riddick understood and would move aside to let her by. He didn't move, however, looking up at the model, which was still frozen in the position that spelled out their doom, but she couldn't see the emotions he was feeling, for the cold goggles blocked his eyes. "Riddick…?" Moving back a bit, to see him better, she watched him slowly bring his eyes back down to her, though she couldn't see them through the goggles, and he was watching her just as closely. Evaluating her, sensing things…she didn't know, but it made her nervous.

"What's going on in here?" It was Johns, once again. He was never far from Riddick, obviously untrustworthy of him, and he already had the gun half-drawn from its holster. Alicia, although she hated Johns, knew that he would tell Carolyn what was happening.

"Johns, there's going to be an eclipse. I don't know when, but soon. A long one. We've got to get the cells here now and get the fuck off this rock!" Johns raised an eyebrow, and looked at the model that she was gesturing violently at. To Alicia's frustration, he didn't move. "JOHNS! When I say now, I mean right this fucking instant!" When still he didn't move, she groaned in frustration, and shoved past him, running towards the skiff, yelling Carolyn's name.

________________________________________  
Alicia couldn't get why they hadn't gone to get the cells yet, and nobody would explain it to her. It seemed that only Johns and Carolyn knew for sure what the reason was, for Shazza and the others were just as lost as her. They just said that there was no need to panic, that the solar eclipse could happen anytime in the entire month, and they had tons of time. Shazza had got the sandcat working, and Carolyn just needed to give the skiff a system's check, make sure everything was running smoothly. This was around the time that Alicia made the first, no, second disturbing discovery about Johns. The first had been discovering he was trying to hit on her (that had been obvious), which had creeped her out to no end.

The second had actually been something she'd seen, when she'd awoken from sleep. First off, Riddick was not in his usual position of watchdog in the corner, which made her nervous, and she was quick to get up and out. About to sweep back the cloth, she paused, hearing sounds from just outside. Pushing back just a small amount of cloth, just enough to peer out of, she saw Johns sitting against one wall, a red box open next to him, revealing at least thirty little shotgun bullet casings. As she watched, he opened one of the casings, withdrawing what appeared to be a very tiny vile of liquid. Withdrawing some sort of instrument that she didn't recognize, she saw him slid the vile into it, then suppressed a gasp of horror as a needle popped out of the end, glinting lethally in the sunlight. He raised it up, obviously with the intention of injecting it into his tear duct, but she couldn't watch anymore, and turned her head, shuddering, pressed against the wall.

Through the cloth, she could hear the murmur of voices. It sounded like Carolyn had also caught Johns in the act, but what they were saying was muffled and incomprehensible. She heard Johns say something about morphine, and then Carolyn saying something about two mornings. Then Carolyn raised her voice, yelling about how it was a problem when he let Owens die like he had. Shaking her head in disgust, she heard silence for a few minutes, and the sound of someone exiting. Assuming that the two of them had left, she finally pushed back the cloth, and gasped to see that Johns was still present, and the way he was now looking her over was not at all pleasant.

"Good morning, hot stuff." Don't be going under any illusion that he said this in jest, for his tone was that of someone with a very immediate sexual attraction. Uncomfortable, Alicia murmured a response, then started to move past him, but this time he did not let her go so easily. His hand snaked out and wrapped around her wrist, stopping her. "Now hold on, I wasn't finished…" When she tried to pull away, he pulled her closer, wrapping an arm around her waist and drawing him close. Looking up into his eyes, she could see that his pupils were dilated, and fear clutched at her. He was high, and that one injection had erased any inhibitions he had harbored.

"Let me go, Johns!" Trying to break through the drug-induced fog he had placed upon himself, she spoke loudly and slowly, trying not to let the fear she was feeling seep into her voice. When he didn't let go, and tried to move in for a kiss, she found herself suddenly resolved into action. Bringing one hand back, she clenched it tightly into a fist and swung it forward as hard as she could. A groan was the reaction, and she was released, with Johns clutching his now bleeding nose. Not waiting for him to recover, she ran for the exit, only to run into, not Riddick for once, but Paris, who had apparently been on his way to awaken her. Although he was babbling almost incomprehensibly, it didn't matter, for the moment her eyes met the horizon, she understood. Already the rings of the planet that was to eclipse the sun were visible, and the dark line of the actual planet on the horizon was beginning to appear. Paris ran off, and leaped aboard the already running sandcat, but she stumbled, and fell to her knees in the sand.

The sandcat was starting to move, slowly, and even Johns had somehow managed to get aboard before her, one hand holding his nose, which wasn't bleeding any longer. Obviously her punch had not been as hard as she'd thought. In fact, the only person who wasn't on the sandcat, she realised as she ran towards it, was Riddick. Just as she was about to turn around and search for him, two hands encircled her waist and lifted her up off the ground slightly, turning her and resting her on the sandcat, with her feet hanging off the edge. With startled eyes, she watched as Riddick jumped up onto the sandcat with ease as well, and she thought she saw the ghost of a smile pass over his face as he glanced at her. Then the emotionless face returned, so fast that she wondered if the smile had been a trick of the light.

Pulling her legs up, she sat next to Riddick, and rested her hands on her knees. Although it was difficult to hear each other over the sound of the sandcat's motor, she heard Jack yell something at her. Something about…being hurt? Looking confusedly at him, he raised his voice and yelled again.

"Did you hurt yourself?" He was pointing at her knuckles, and she glanced down, and noticed that there was blood spotted on them. Shrugging at him, she tried to smile innocently as she carefully wiped the blood off, but she could see that Riddick had looked as well, and then sharply over at Johns, where it was obvious that his nose had been bleeding recently. Judging by the deep, almost homicidal, look that passed on his face momentarily, she could see that he'd made the connection. He was even about to stand up, and suddenly she slid her hand over and clenced his forearm with an iron grip. If he killed Johns, the others would likely kill him. He would be free if he would just restrain his anger, and once they were off this god-forsaken rock, she would…she didn't know what she would do, but she would somehow make it worth it for him.

Alicia managed, somehow, to convey all of this in a single look and a headshake, and, although no emotions passed over his face, she could see there was a moment in which he considered defying her wish and striking out anyway. Then, she could see his muscles slowly untense, and she let out the breath she hadn't even realised she'd been holding. Letting her hand slide slowly from his forearm, she let both of them sit clenched together in her lap, and prayed for a miracle. They were racing against time, and she could see the rings of the planet was already almost touching the sun. The sandcat was solar powered, not to mention the creatures that were going to appear as soon as the sun went down. Already their number, which had begun as twelve, was down to ten. Two people gone…how many more would go once the sun went down?

Finally, after what seemed like hours of snail-like movement (though really it couldn't have been more than ten to twenty minutes), they arrived at the crash-site. Alicia started to hop down to go help carry fuel cells, but found herself almost subconsciously pushed back on to the sandcat by a familiar muscular hand. Riddick somehow made the action so casual that nobody except the one pushed back would notice it. A look passed between them, and she understood that he was just…looking out for her. As she watched them disappear into the ship, she found herself wondering, all of a sudden, why he was still looking out for her. His debt had been repayed long ago, and yet he still protecting her, like a brother, or a father or…or a lover? Is that what you were going to say? Have you lost your fucking mind? Just helping him once got you into a heap of trouble…you can't let yourself get that close to him. Not a fucking chance. Get out now while you still can…

These thoughts were shoved unceremoniously to the back of her mind the second she turned her head and was met with the last few rays of light. They were too late…Jack and Shazza were trying desperately to clean off the part of the generator that drew in the sun, but even they knew it was too late. The sun was almost gone. Even as the motor ground to a halt, and the fuel cells were dropped next to her feet, she had already turned her head and jumped off the sandcat, her eyes inexplicably drawn to the spires, and then hell broke loose. The tiny screeching demons who had claimed the life of Ali were spiralling into a huge tornado of hate, loathing, and, most importantly, darkness. The entire group seemed mesmerized by them, even Riddick, who didn't seem too fazed, but was watching them, nonetheless. It was Paris, from the cargo container, where he had apparently ran to do God knows what, that broke them from their almost fatal attraction.

"Just a suggestion…" He yelled across the sands, causing Alicia to turn her head slightly to glance at him. "But perhaps you should flee!" Then everybody was moving, running, tripping over themselves, charging for Paris and the relative safety of the cargo hold. Alicia found herself frozen for maybe half a second longer than anyone else, still watching the deadly cloud, until a section of it broke off and started screeching its way towards them. With a cry, she ran, her feet nearly dropping from under her, but steadying, and she ran. Far in front of her she could see Carolyn, Imam and his students, Johns, and Paris. Shazza was only a few feet in front, and Riddick was somewhere behind. Knowing that looking behind could cause her own demise, she just prayed that he wasn't stupid (or brave enough) to not run. The screeching of the hatchlings was almost overcome by her ragged breathing and the pounding of her blood in her ears. I'm not going to make it…Came the desperate thought as she heard the screeching getting closer, and the cargo hold seemed so far away…

Suddenly something slammed into her behind, sending her with a startled cry over the edge of a dune, only to land and roll like a log to lie flat on her back at the bottom. Breathing heavily, she was about to stand, when suddenly there was just…blackness. Moving, writing blackness, and the screeching threatened to deafen her, and she was afraid to scream should they hear her and suddenly dive at her face and eyes…and then it was gone. Still breathing heavily, she dared to flip on to her stomach, using her hands, she prepared to stand and run, as she could see Shazza preparing to do just ahead of her. Just as Shazza began to run, something latched on to her ankles, and then when she struggled, was on to her back, pinning her to the ground.  
First instinct: Fight. Struggling against the mass that pinned her body to the ground, her breaths wouldn't come, and whatever was on top of her wouldn't let her move. Flashes of her struggle with the creature in the hole came to her mind, on and off, the feeling as the teeth and claws cut into her legs like knives, and the same feeling of desperation lit her movements as she struggled against the weight. It felt like hours passed in the space of a few seconds, and through it all she didn't hear the screeching of the hatchlings until they were directly above them, and then she gasped, startled, and stopped struggling, unable to turn away, with some sort of morbid fascination. Shazza, who hadn't heard the warnings of the group, and who nobody had stopped from getting up and running, had the hatchlings suddenly upon her, pushing her forward, and then her top half left the bottom half. For a moment, Alicia thought she was seeing things…her mind just wouldn't allow such a horrifing thing to be true. Yet it was…very true…and she watched as the hatchlings, carrying the still screaming upper half of Shazza, disappeared. For a moment all was still, but the hold on her had released, though the weight had not been lifted.

Then things were moving again. Whatever was on top of her shifted, allowing her to stand shakily, and she turned slowly, knowing now what she would see. Goggles stared back at her, but somehow she thought she could see a mixture of relief and apologies, despite the fact that she couldn't see his eyes. He had saved her. He had risked his own life by flinging himself up from the ground and pinning her so that she wouldn't run and meet the same fate that Shazza had. For a moment, words escaped her: she wanted to say everything in the world, and at the same time say nothing…for what could she say to the man who saved her life, not just once, but two or three times?

"Thank you." She said finally, and smiled lightly, despite everything, and he nodded solemnly. She thought she saw the beginnings of a smile at the edge of his lips, but then he began to walk on, and she followed. Paris and the others had already retreated into the cargo hold, leaving only Carolyn, who stood waiting for them. As Alicia moved ahead, her hand resting on the door of the cargo hold, they all paused, hearing an unholy sound. Not the harsh, violent screeching of the hatchlings…something that sounded more like…like echos of a past horror. Like screams of a dying world.

Riddick had turned and removed his goggles, looking out towards the spires, and she could hear them crumbling and falling apart. Turning, she waited, half in the shadows, half in the small bit of light that remained, and tried to see what was coming for them in the darkness.

"Riddick?" Carolyn broke the silence, perhaps not even realising that Alicia was still there. "What is it?" They depended on Riddick now, the only one who could see their worst enemies on this, the planet of hate and destruction. Riddick, who had once been their biggest fear, had now turned into their only hope for survival.

"Like I said." Riddick said with an almost amused tone of voice, and a small smile. "It ain't me you gotta worry about." And in the darkness, the screams continued on their unending chorus.

((Ta da! Chapter 5, in the flesh. Sorry, it's not very long, but I wanted to update before I leave on my vacation. Okay, guys, I may not be able to update much on my vacation, which is in a few days. But DON'T WORRY. I will be updating as soon as I come back because I will be writing while on vacation. I'm just not sure if I'll have any access to the internet at any time. So, I will see you soon! –kisses and hugs-))


	6. Then There Were Seven

((Chapter 6! Alright guys, I'm really enjoying this story and I hope you guys are too, so heeeeeere we go. Thanks to all my reviewers, you guys are the bomb, I love ya :-) Thanks again! ))

The cargo container felt very tiny, as the rest of the group all huddled together, to stay in the little light that they had. Nine people left: Carolyn, Johns, Jack, Imam, his two students; Hassan and Suleiman, Paris, Riddick, and herself. Nine left out of twelve. Everybody was shaken by what had happened to Shazza, and Jack kept saying about how if she'd just stayed down she wouldn't have died…she would have been fine. Alicia had no independent light, so she just stayed near those who did have it, deathly afraid of what lurked outside of the cargo hold. So far, it seemed, only she had survived an encounter with the creatures, and that was through outside intervention. Said 'outside intervention' was sitting at the very edge of the light, watching the rest of them with a sort of disinterest, but he was there, which gave her a sort of detached feeling of comfort.

The others were discussing the sounds that could be heard outside of the walls, the sounds that sounded like the echoing screams from her worst nightmares, but Alicia didn't join in. Just sat tight against the wall, making sure none of her was in shadow, with her knees tucked against her chest. Although the position would suggest somebody on the brink of going insane from fear, she was feeling almost lucid. The sight of two glowing eyes sedated the fear she thought would be coursing through her veins, her protection from the nightmares. Suddenly, this fear returned in full force as there was clanking from, not outside, but within the cargo container. Something was inside.

Riddick and Johns were up ahead of the group, looking out, Johns with his light, Riddick with his eyes, and for a moment one might actually think they were getting along. In the light that Johns flashed around the very small area that could be seen, there was nothing of importance. Yet the sounds persisted, and Alicia skittered backwards, banging into Jack, and glancing at him. The once brave and reckless Jack was close to a breakdown, she could see, he was shaking, and his bottom lip was quivering. Forgetting her own fear, she smiled lightly at him.

"D-don't worry." She whispered, trying to keep her voice steady, despite her own fear. "We're going to be fine." I hope so anyway. Jack smiled vaguely, and nodded his head, before they both looked up as Paris stumbled past them, heading towards the door, obviously in a panic. "Paris!" She yelled, along with everybody else as everybody grabbed him and managed to pin him before he opened the door.

"You don't know what's out there." Carolyn said in almost a hiss, with her fists clenching some of his expensive clothes in them as she held him to the wall, knowing that if he opened that door they were all dead. Alicia stood up, watching as Imam managed to break open another door, so that they could try and get farther away from the beast that had somehow managed to get into the compartment. Her hands were shaking as she clasped them and unclasped them. Every so often, she reached up and adjusted her glasses, which, amazingly, were still relatively unbroken and still on her face. The frames were bent slightly, causing them to sit crookedly on her face, but the lenses were intact, which was good because without them…she'd be blind as a bat.

They all hurried through the door, which was then placed back where it belonged, and closed tightly. They all breathed for a moment, with a false sense of security that the closed door brought, as Imam leaned against it, breathless. The only person who didn't stop moving was Riddick, who had found the blowtorch and had lit it over Paris' shoulder, giving them a lot more light. Suddenly there was a spike that drove through the door only a few inches from Imam's head. He gasped and rushed forward, almost directly into her, sending her stumbling backwards to hit the other wall of the relatively small room. Just to her left, Riddick was burning with the blowtorch, making a wide circle. As soon as he was done, he kicked the piece through, and Alicia was the first to crawl through. When she was struggling to get up and out of the way, she felt someone gently take her hand and pull her to her feet before tugging her gently out of the way of Paris, who was the next to struggle through the hole. Alicia didn't even have to look to know who, and she felt the hand linger in hers for a moment, before quickly releasing her. He then retreated into darkness, as if afraid of what might be seen should someone look closer.

The blowtorch had been left sitting on a small upturned piece of debris; that happened to have a flat surface. After much approaches and retreats because of heat, she picked it up, allowing the others to grab the piece of debris and shove it against the opening to try and keep the creatures at bay. Sending the light from the blowtorch into the dark, she squinted, trying to see Riddick, who had disappeared. Carolyn approached, and took the blowtorch from her, obviously with the intent of burning through to the next cargo area, giving them more time to decide what to do. Forgetting her fear of the dark, forgetting about the desire to stay in the light, Alicia moved forward in the direction that Riddick had disappeared into, frowning.

"Riddick?" She called out, squinting as she tried to see in the darkness. Where did he go? About to open her mouth to call again, a sound in the darkness startled her. Something falling and then a gasp. Stopping, dead still, she squinted in the darkness again, and strained her ears. From somewhere in the dark she could hear ragged breathing, from someone who was cornered and terrified. It sounded younger, and for a moment she thought perhaps Jack had been cornered somewhere. Moving forward a bit more, trying to resolve the many shadows into something recognizable, she caught sight of, not Jack, but the little pilgrim boy, Hassan, seemingly alone, staring up at two creatures who were moving down towards him from up on the boxes.

Don't move…don't move, just stay still, Hassan…Trying to will her thoughts to the boy, she moved another step closer, still in the dark, out of sight of Hassan. Something was extending sharply from the creatures' claw-like hands, reaching out to probe Hassan in the darkness. Hassan, obviously losing it, took off down towards where Alicia stood behind another box, in a separate makeshift hallway. Just as she was reaching out to pull Hassan in to where she was standing, something lunged out from the darkness almost directly in front of her, chopping the little boy in half before he even got the chance to scream. For a half-second her hand hovered in mid-air, as she stared at the blood that now stained her own clothes, as well as the creatures that lunged from behind and tackled the other, fighting over their new food. For a few frozen seconds she was in shock, nothing moving, barely even breathing. Then she screamed.

This drew the attention of the creatures, all of which turned their heads to locate the source of the noise, but Alicia couldn't move. Rooted to her spot, frozen in terror, she could only watch, her screams now dead in her throat, as one of the creatures started moving, still looking for her in the dark. Then suddenly something turned the corner and rammed into her from the side, sending her stumbling towards where the others were waiting, trying to see what was going on. Arms grabbed her before she fell to the ground and pushed her forward again, still running and moving fast. Alicia couldn't figure out what was going on, it was all a blur of movement and screaming.

"Move! MOVE!" This, if nothing else, broke through her haze of fear and she bolted the direction she was being shoved, hearing, not only Riddick behind her, but the wailing of a creature not far behind him. Then the group ahead of her, obviously not understanding what was going, shined their flashlights at them and inadvertently shone them directly into her eyes, temporarily blinding her now dark accustomed eyes. She instinctively slowing down to avoid collision while she was blinking to recover her vision. Riddick, who had obviously been even more blinded by the light, slammed into her, knocking her to the ground and landing on top of her, knocking the breath out of her with a whoosh. As she struggled to gather up her breath again, the sounds of gunshots could be heard as Johns obviously shot at what had been behind them.

For a long moment there was silence, and she could feel harsh breathing against her neck, and as she turned her head to see what was going on, a whisper drifted into her ear. "New rule: When I say move…you move, and you don't stop until I say so. Got it?" Nodding her head, he let out his breath in what might have been relief and then stood up, picking her up off the ground on his way, and depositing her on her feet. The rest of the group had sort of huddled together, peering at what appeared to be the dead body of the creature. As Carolyn shone the light over it, the skin rippled and bubbled as if it was boiling, and Alicia gasped, her eyes wide.

"You okay, Sara? Riddick?" Carolyn asked, and it took a moment for Alicia to remember that she was referring to her. She nodded, and Carolyn led the group through the other hole that had been made in the wall. Alicia wrapped her arms around herself and sat against a wall, watching the blowtorch that sat in the middle of the makeshift circle, keeping them all in light. A silence came as they all caught their breath and looked around at one another, the survivors. Eight of them left…

Imam sat against one wall, his prayer beads rattling lightly in his hand, his eyes downcast. Him and the one remaining student were grieving for Hassan; as best they could without a proper ceremony like they had performed for Ali. Carolyn was standing against one wall, staring at the blowtorch, and somehow Alicia could see that she was trying very hard to deal with the responsibility that had been shoved on to her. As the one remaining crewmember left alive, she was the one responsible for all of their lives. Jack was in a corner, knees drawn to his chest, practically a quivering mass of fear where once there had been a headstrong, reckless, and brave young man. Paris was smoking a cigar, and waving himself with his fan, and seemed to have calmed quite a bit since when he'd panicked, back in the first cargo area. Johns sat, with his gun still loose in his holster, looking across the room at her with an expression of malice as well as irritation. He had not forgotten what had happened back at the settlement, and she knew, despite everything that was happening, that he would find a way to get his revenge.  
Finally, Riddick sat not far to the left of Johns with his goggles back on, so it was unclear what he was feeling or who he was looking at. They were a diverse group, the last people you'd expect to be forced to work together. Finally, Carolyn spoke, making an inventory of how much light they had, with Paris piping up that his alcohol would burn very well. Not sure where Carolyn was going with it, she lifted her head from where she had resumed watching the fire from the blowtorch with a sort of dreamy fascination.

"Okay. Maybe we have enough." Everyone looked at her, Alicia included, and it seemed she was the only one who understood what she was talking about right away. The only way to escape death was to get those fuel cells to the skiff. Carolyn said just that, and Johns was the one to react, almost laughingly angry at such a ludicrous idea, using Jack and even herself as a smoke screen to hide what was obviously his own fear.

"Well, why don't you just shut your fucking mouth for a second and let me come up with a plan that doesn't involve MASS SUICIDE!" He yelled across the space at Carolyn. There was silence, in which Carolyn watched Johns, cool and collected, not at all affected. After another moment, Alicia opened her mouth, not sure why she was interfering, but not enjoying being used as a smokescreen.

"I…I think Carolyn's plan is the best. We're going to die in here if we wait for the suns to come back up, which might take months." Alicia said slowly, earning a grateful look from Carolyn, and the turn of Johns' anger on to her. "If we strike out with as much light as we can, we have a good chance of making it back…." Imam and Paris were looking convinced, but Johns was now standing up, towering over her as she stood, but, for once, she didn't back off. She stood tall, and looked him in the eye, taking a deep breath.

"Do you?" Still standing, looking down at her, his voice held an intense threat. Standing her ground, she took a deep breath and nodded her head, without breaking eye contact. She'd relied on Riddick and others to protect her for too long, and if she wanted to make good on her resolve to not fall any closer towards caring for Riddick, she'd have to be independent. "Do you really?"

"I do, Johns. I really do." Johns paused, obviously knocked mentally off-balance by the simple answer she had given him. Perhaps expecting her to take it back or stammer out a reason, he wasn't sure how to respond, and it didn't matter, because Carolyn took over the conversation, but Alicia didn't sit down, still staring at him in the eyes, her fists clenched at her sides. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Riddick slowly stand, his eyes fixed on Johns, who was still watching Alicia in what some might consider a peculiar manner.

"How much do you weigh, Johns?" Johns blinked over at Carolyn, and then, with one last wrathful (yet vaguely lustful) look at Alicia, turned his attention to Carolyn. Using the reprieve, Alicia took a seat next to Riddick, and slowly released her hands from their fists. On her palms were four half-moon marks from the force of her nails digging into her skin. Riddick had also slowly sat back down, and glanced at her hands, which were now resting on her knee. Everybody had their attentions focussed on Carolyn and Johns, and Riddick took this as an opportunity to gently reach over, and she watched as he hesitated, perhaps unsure about something. Then he dropped his hand to hers and squeezed gently, showing, without words, that she'd done the right thing. Then, before anyone noticed, he let it go, and she let it slide slowly to her side. All of this happened before Johns had even answered Carolyn's question, and they both turned their attentions to it as he said around 79 kilos and asked why.

"Because you're 79 kilos of gutless white meat and that's why you can't think of a better plan." Carolyn responded, and Johns advanced on her, but Riddick stood up first and was between the two of them. For a moment there was an angry silence, broken only by a light tapping, which was revealed to be Riddick's shiv against the inside of Johns' thigh, where the intent was obvious. Johns, after a few moments, slid back to his seat, staring sullenly at all of them.

________________________________________  
Finally, a decision was made, and they all exited the cargo in a large group, with Johns a couple feet behind, obviously sulking and angry. Riddick hovered on the outside of their tight-knit group, and every few seconds he would end up with his arm right over top of her, obviously with some sort of subconscious (or perhaps he knew what he was doing, she didn't know) will to shield her from whatever lay beyond their circle of light. Carolyn walked directly in front of them, with the blowtorch held high, though there didn't seem to be anything in the immediate area. They approached the ship, which was almost pitch black within. Everybody paused, and Alicia was envisioning the hundreds of possibilities for how whatever could leap out of them would maul her to pieces and then eat her. It was not a pleasant idea, and she found her wondering if maybe the idea of trying to get back to the skiff had been such a wonderful, ingenious idea after all.

Riddick suddenly disappeared from her side, walking up the group of people, removing his goggles once he got closer. Carolyn had called him to check it out before they headed in. Alicia, unsure what she was doing, slid forward along the group, until she was behind Carolyn, then moved again until she was next to her, only a few feet behind Riddick now. He was scanning the depths of the ship, and for a half-second, she envisioned something leaping out of the darkness and chopping him in half, just like they had done to Hassan. In fact, the vision was so strong that she nearly took a step forward to rip him backwards, away from the danger. Her hand even slid away from her side before she paused, realising what she was doing.

"Looks clear." Riddick called, breaking into her thoughts, and she moved forward, just a tad past Carolyn, when suddenly there was an unholy screech and something lunged out in the darkness. Screaming once, quickly, somebody yanked her to the right, just out of the path of the flying creature. Time slowed down for the barest of seconds, as she felt more than saw the creature pass less than a foot from her before tumbling backwards down a small slope and landing, not surprisingly, next to Riddick on her back, staring up into the endless black abyss of the sky. Her feet were at a higher angle than her head, so that all the blood was rushing down to it, giving her a rather light-headed sensation.

"You said it was clear!" Turning her head, she found that Riddick was on his stomach, head around where her feet were, and Johns was next to him on his back, still clinging to his gun, chewing Riddick out. Groaning because now her head was beginning to hurt, she managed to swivel slowly until her head was the right way around. Crawling up the slope, she didn't hear the rest of the conversation between Riddick and Johns. It was probably angry, in any case.

Once back onto flat land, Carolyn and the others were moving into the ship, and she started to follow, stumbling a little as her blood rushed back down from her head, disorienting her a bit because of the light-headedness. Within two seconds there was a strong hand on the small of her back, steadying her and propelling her towards the ship before the light that Carolyn carried left her out of its circle. Although she wouldn't have needed to turn her head to recognise the touch, she did nonetheless and caught sight of Johns, his eyes looking right at them. There was no curiousity or surprise in his expression, just hot anger and humiliation. Kind of a 'you chose him over me?' kind of look.

Alicia took a quick moment to actually look him over, see how he carried himself. The way he gripped the huge gauge (which was probably so big to compensate for his lack of size in other areas, not that she had ever seen it), and the way he walked like he owned the planet…he dripped ego. Maybe a woman had never resisted him in his entire life, what with the shiny badge and the huge gun that they would squeal over. Maybe that was why he resented her so, for being the first to not be blinded by the glare off his badge, so much so that the woman missed the true quality of their suitor until it was much too late. In fact, now that she thought about it, had she not been told ahead of time that Johns was not a cop, but a merc, she would have likely been just as taken with the shiny badge. Trusted him unquestioningly, because of it. Funny how the world threw you things that looked like curves, but somehow managed to work out in your advantage.

Being distracted by Carolyn appearing and giving out assignments, Alicia had no more time to ponder the bizarre twists that fate threw her into. Alicia was instructed to aid Jack in ripping down the blue neon tubes that lined most of the cabin, and went to it enthusiastically. The fuel cells, the bottles of alcohol, and the generator that would keep the lights alit would be dragged along by Imam and Johns, while everybody else took a side, everybody guarding everybody else. Riddick would be running in front, leading the way, because he was the only one who could guide them safely back to the skiff. He was also the only one who could really see what would be following them in the dark as they walked.  
They were to wrap the neon lights around themselves, as a source of light, as well as they would have the blowtorch. If an emergency came up or the generator broke down, they had the whiskey bottles to light, plus the flares that Johns had. Riddick and Carolyn were walking around, supervising and giving other instructions. The generator was pulled from where it had been stored beneath the deck, and placed on the sled.

"Check your cuts." Riddick's voice came out of nowhere, addressing not just Carolyn now but everybody around. "These bad boys know our blood now." With this in mind, Alicia took a moment to check up on the cuts on her legs, to make sure that they hadn't been re-opened. She'd managed to escape infection by the skin of her teeth, and they had scabbed over. Resisting the urge to pick at the scab, which had been a bad habit of hers ever since she'd been a kid, she returned to the task at hand.

________________________________________  
With no time or effort wasted, they were finally ready. Imam was hooked through one of the chains at the front, to drag the sled, and Alicia had agreed (albeit reluctantly) to be at the back of the sled with Paris. Johns had disappeared, not that she would have really been that upset if he had been killed, and Carolyn re-entered the ship to go find him. The only light that Alicia and Paris had between them was the blowtorch that Paris had insisted upon holding, and then the neon blue lights that was looped over their shoulders multiple times. It gave everyone a sickly blue glow, almost frightening. Riddick stood at the front, not looking back, with a flashlight chain rigged to shine down his back but not into his light-sensitive eyes.

Johns finally appeared, and she could tell by the way he walked that he was enjoying a morphine high. Which could be the reason he was brave enough to reach over on his way by and give her ass a quick squeeze. Had she not been attached to the sled and distracted by Paris blabbering at her about something (obviously trying to settle his own fears by talking), she would have attacked him, taken his gun, and shot a hole right through his heart. Well...she would have slapped him, anyway. Although Paris was beginning to get on her nerves, she let him talk, blotting it out with thoughts of the best way to move so that she wouldn't get left behind by the sled.

Finally, they began to move. Slowly at first, but then faster as Riddick sped up his pace, obviously with no real intention of slowing up for them or anybody else. Imam and Johns moved as fast as they could, considering they were carrying something like 200 kilograms or more on that sled, and the rest of them moved along, shining their lights around. Although she couldn't see them, Alicia could feel, just behind them, the ranks of the creatures closing in at the edge of the light. They were just waiting…for an opportunity. Everything was moving well…nobody had tripped or been injured and they were still moving at a good pace. Alicia used the flame from the blowtorch as a light to guide her as to where she was running.

Suddenly there was a small popping sound and that light went out. Looking up, she saw Paris looking at the blowtorch with a gasp. They were out of fuel. Imam, from his position dragging the sled, yelled at them to stay close, and they both sped up their pace. Alicia clung with a grip like steel to her neon lights, pointing it around her. The fear of death and of the creatures had been shoved to the back of her mind, out of necessity. If she focussed on those fears, she knew she wouldn't be able to function, that she would be in some corner, rocking back and forth with her eyes closed and her ears blocked, shutting it out until the pain came…

It was these thoughts that distracted Alicia. So that she didn't know what was happening until it was happening. Jack had gone off to the side of the sled, to pick something up apparently, and suddenly something was swooping down on her. Imam, disengaging himself from the sled, flung himself on to her, pulling her aside, and the creature missed. Then all hell broke loose. With the distraction, something had swooped at Paris, knocking him over, and he was now crawling away, his lights still attached, obviously panicking and crawling blindly. Alicia, not sure what to do, yanked her lights off and started to move after him, yelling his name, knowing that if he didn't stop he was going to yank the generator off the sled, and then they'd all be stuck in the dark.

Shots echoed around, but stopped suddenly, and just as she was giving up on chasing Paris, something tackled her from behind, flipping her over and pinning her to the ground. Startled, she looked up and found herself staring up into the dilated pupils of Johns, still on the tail ends of his morphine high. "Mind you don't get cut…they know our blood…." He hissed, and she felt something slice into her leg, and then into her arm, and cried out, but before she could fight back, he was gone, sprinting back to the sled. Oh fuck. Knowing that she was now bleeding openly from two wounds, she heard somebody say something about France, and dying. It was far away, and she knew that Paris was gone. Pushing herself to her hands and knees, she crawled desperately towards the light. Not much farther…not much farther…keep going… From somewhere above her head, she heard what sounded like a banshee, then realised that it was a creature. FUCK!

Certain she was going to die, she started silently praying to God for forgiveness for whatever sins she may have committed over the years. Shit, how do those prayers go again? Um...As I lay me down to sleep...no, wrong ones. Our Father, who art in heaven...hallowed be thy name...they kingdom come...oh fuck it. Please, dear God, forgive me for all the shit I've done and let me go up to heaven when I get mauled... . There was another sound of a banshee cry, and she braced for whatever pain was going to come. There was a swooshing sound as a creature dive-bombed towards her from the sky. Something yanked her roughly to the side, and she thought she felt herself being dragged, and again, she braced for teeth into her back or her side, ready for the death that was coming from the creature.

It didn't come.

"Sara…" Having closed her eyes tightly, to avoid having to see what was killing her, she carefully opened them again, and found that she was on her back, now in the light again. "Are you alright? Come on, get up…." It wasn't Riddick who stood above her, but Carolyn and Jack, who carefully helped her to a sitting position. Looking around, she found those glowing eyes not far from her position, half in darkness, watching her as she stood up shakily. He had saved her. It was obvious by the way he looked at her, with what looked almost like relief in his eyes, though she knew that nobody else could see it.

"I'm fine…" She whispered in response to queries about her health, and then she remembered the slicing feeling that had gone into her arm and her leg. Looking down, she saw that one of her cuts had been re-opened with a long slice on her right leg, from a knife of some sort, and her arm had an identical kind running along her forearm. Looking around, she spotted Johns, who was the only one (other than Riddick of course) who was not crowded around her, asking if she was okay. The only lights now were the makeshift torches that had been made out of Paris' whiskey bottles. The generator was shot, and the plan, she supposed, was to leave the neon lights where they were. Less to carry.

"You're bleeding." Everybody looked over at Riddick, surprised that he had spoken. Alicia had attempted to hide the cut, not wanting people fussing over her and wasting the light. He, however, was pointing at her leg, and at her arm. "You must have been nicked by one of the creatures." Alicia looked up sharply, and over at him. His face was emotionless, and she couldn't tell if he knew the truth about what had happened or not…surely he couldn't believe cuts as clean as those were from the creatures.

"We don't have any bandages…." Carolyn said, almost as if she were cursing herself for not thinking of this. It wasn't her fault though…probably everyone assumed that anybody that got even close enough to a creature to touch it was going to die. Alicia hadn't even thought about it, to be honest, and she still wasn't thinking about it. "Here, sit down on the sled…." That's what Carolyn began to say, leading her towards the sled, but she pulled away, shaking her head.

"No, I'm fine. We're wasting light…just keep going. I'm fine, look it's already almost stopped bleeding." This was sort of a lie, it was still bleeding openly, though the bleeding had slowed from a constant flow to a sort of oozing, dripping down her leg and down her arm. Riddick was looking at her, and it seemed as if he were thinking about something. Trying to decide whether to interfere, to keep her from doing something potentially stupid. "Look, here, watch this." Not sure what she was doing, she ripped a piece out of her T-shirt, which was already beginning to be frayed, and wrapped it around her arm, making a suitable bandage. Ripping out another piece, she wrapped it around her leg, biting her lip with a small hiss as she tied it tight. Her T-shirt had now become a midriff revealing tank-top, but she had bandages.

Carolyn hesitated, but then Johns came forward, and slid the chain over his shoulder. "You heard her, she said she's fine, let's get going." Riddick glanced back at him, and it seemed that only Alicia saw the look of extreme loathing that he sent. Imam took the other chain, and soon they were getting ready to move again, but Carolyn took the back, while Alicia was put to the side, to keep her in the middle and safe. Alicia blinked, realising that everything had taken on a blurry quality, and reached up to adjust her glasses, only to find that they weren't there. Just when she was cursing having lost the one piece of her wardrobe that was incredibly necessary, a hand slid into hers from behind, handing over some item, before continuing on. It was Riddick, on his way from the back to where he was to lead at the front. Looking down, she saw her glasses, generally unharmed. Where Riddick had picked them up, she didn't want to know. Smiling lightly at his back, she then began to move as the procession moved. Instead of a neon blue light wrapped around her, she had a torch in her hand.

And then there were seven…

((Dun dada Dun! There is the end of Chapter 6. It's kind of crappy, I realise, but I hope it'll keep you happy. Like I said, I don't know if I'll be able to update while I'm on vacation. So yeah. Enjoy guys!))


	7. Promise In A Dark Land

((YES! I finally got internet access so that I can update! This is a pretty long chapter, since I was writing for quite a few days straight without getting a chance to update. I did manage to separate what I had into chapters. Well…one and a half chapters. Anyway, enough rambling. Oh, by the way, I apologise in advance if I mix up some quotes, I don't have the movie on hand to review…anyway, yeah, finishing up now…))

There was no talk of sleep or rest as they walked, even though it had been going on two days for some of them that they hadn't slept. Nobody would ever be able to sleep, however, not with the knowledge of what lay beyond the shadows. The knowledge that while they slept, the lights could go out, or some brave creature might dart into a dimly lit area and snatch one of them away before anybody would awaken to save them. 'The creatures'; when written on paper, it seemed so bland and ordinary, not the kind of words that would immediately instil fear or panic. Alicia knew, however, that the words would never have the same meaning to her ever again. Just the word 'creature' would have the power to give her nightmares that would haunt her for a long time.

They had been walking for going on two or three hours, and something in the back of Alicia's mind was nagging at her, something that wasn't quite right…. She didn't bother trying to put her finger on it, she had much more pressing things to put her mind on, which was mostly just to continue moving each leg forward at the same pace as everybody else. Her head was absolutely throbbing, from God knows what; blood loss or stress or some unknown force exerting pressure on her forehead. Once the adrenaline that had gripped her and made her blood rush like hot fire through her veins had passed, the pain had flung at her full-force. The cuts on her arms and legs burned like flames licking at her skin, torching it every time she moved, and it had taken every ounce of willpower in her body to not cry out, or ask for a quick stop. The makeshift bandages had become swiftly soaked with blood, but they had served their purpose, keeping the wounds from the dust and dirt. The tightly wrapped pieces of disturbingly grey-red cloths hadn't loosened or unravelled, allowing them to continue on without need of stopping. Though even now, her leg was burning in fiery pain every time she put her weight on it, she forced herself to stand straight and not falter. Weakness was not an option. Not around the creature with the big gauge who still dragged the sled with Imam.

Although nobody had said anything, Alicia could see them sneaking glances at her out of the corner of her eye. When she'd look over at them, she'd usually catch them hurriedly moving their eyes back towards the front. Twice now, she had encountered the creatures, and survived. Third time's the charm…Alicia thought bitterly, wondering if anybody begrudged her for living where others had died. She certainly was feeling guilty enough that it might as well be true. Not her fault…she was just lucky…and had an invincible protection. At least she liked to think he was invincible. The thought of him dying sent shock waves of distress through her and caused her gut to tighten, as if icy cold hands had squeezed them. The only exception was Johns, who had not moved his eyes from the front the entire time they had been walking. She could tell, however, judging by the way his jaw was set tightly, that he was not at all pleased that she had survived his attempt at indirect murder.

Why had she not told them about what he had done? Why had she kept her silence, allowing them to keep the illusion that she had, once again, eluded death by the skin of her teeth? For some, bizarre, unfathomable reason, she had a feeling that they wouldn't believe her. That they would wonder, perhaps like they had the first time, if it had been Riddick who had sliced her, and think that maybe now she was afraid to tell, in case he should suddenly turn and slit her throat before anybody could react. After all, it had been Riddick who had so easily suggested that a creature had cut her, even though those slices looked oddly straight and deliberate to be the jagged claws of the creatures. So, she had held her tongue, despite her desire to get her revenge on Johns, knowing that Riddick would never be trusted if he had attempted murder hanging over his head.

Behind her, she heard Jack whisper to Carolyn, and for a half-second, she actually had the paranoid thought that they were talking about her. Then she realised he had merely asked how much farther they had to go. The nagging feeling at the back of Alicia's mind returned, but once again, she couldn't quite put her finger on what was causing it. Then suddenly the sled stopped, causing Alicia to have to do an odd sort of pirouette sort of move to avoid running into Imam, which put her full weight on her right leg. With an inward hiss, she bit into her lip tightly to avoid crying out instinctively as a jab of pain went flying up her leg. Luckily, everyone was distracted by the reason that they had stopped, which became apparent. Right in front of them there were two grooves in the sand, going from left to right, which she immediately realised were their own. We've crossed our own tracks…Suddenly she realised what had been nagging at the back of her mind. It had seemed like they had walked a long way, yet hadn't reached the huge bones that she'd remember she had nearly knocked herself out on when the sand-cat had sent a large pile of them flying.

Looking up instinctively to see how Riddick was reacting to this new development, she found that he was crouching not far in front of them, serene and emotionless as always. Imam and Johns had dropped the chains of the sled, and Johns had, of course, unhooked his gauge from its holster, glaring at the back of Riddick's head with such ferocity that she was surprised he didn't burn holes into it. Still clutching her torch, she followed the others forward, where Imam was the first to speak.

"Are we going in circles?" At first Alicia didn't think that Riddick had answered, but she'd thought she'd seen his lips move, almost unnoticeably. Perhaps he had been muttering to himself, for Imam continued as if he hadn't said anything. "Do you even know where we are -?"

"Listen!" Riddick said this so forcefully as he stood straight up that nobody seemed to have any thoughts of disobeying, and everybody fell silent. Then it became apparent, from not that far ahead, echoing everywhere, and she unconsciously shifted closer to Riddick, and she thought he glanced down at her with something like a protective look, but then his gaze was back forward. Outside of their circle of light, though she couldn't see them, she could hear the creatures. Thousands, maybe millions of them, all calling out to one another. Had she not already known what lay ahead, she might have thought there were a thousand undead souls waiting to suck their life away. In all honesty, she probably would have preferred that to these demons, that she was now sure had spawned straight from Satan's loins. Bringing her thoughts back to the present, she wondered what significance this had on their travels.

"Canyon ahead." Riddick explained, and she looked forward with a sort of sinking feeling in her stomach. Canyon meant no where to run but straight into Hell to face Satan's children one on one. "I circled once to buy some time to think." Alicia looked over at Riddick again, feeling a bit better, knowing that at least he wasn't afraid. He was being practical, not rushing in headfirst. He had, at least, warned them. Sort of. Johns, on the other hand, was staring out into the blackness as if willing it to reveal it's secret to him. He obviously did not like that Riddick could see what lay ahead and he couldn't…it gave Riddick a serious advantage.

"Well, let's get going then." Alicia said tentatively, causing everybody to look over at her as if they'd just remembered she was present. They'd gone from sneaking furtive looks to completely forgetting her presence. She wasn't positive which she enjoyed better, considering how guilty she felt about all of the ones who had died instead of her.

"Oh I don't know about that." Riddick said, after a short pause, looking directly at her with an almost amused smile on his face, as if he enjoyed telling them about the dangers ahead of them. "That's Death Row up there. Especially with the little girl bleeding." Everybody looked at him like he had lost his mind, Alicia included (because for once she had no idea what he was talking about) but it was Johns who made the obvious statement.

"What are you talking about, what little girl?" For a moment, Alicia actually thought that Riddick had referred to her, for it looked like the clumsy ballerina move she'd made to avoid bumping into Imam had re-opened her leg wound again. Then Riddick turned his head, looking directly behind him, silver eyes gleaming in the night, and it wasn't her or Carolyn that he was looking at, and suddenly the answer seemed to come to everybody. All eyes turned to the frightened looking newly bald young…man? Girl? Jack was standing there, with a look that suggested that if he – she wasn't surrounded by darkness with creatures far worse then their anger, she would be bolting at the moment.

"What?" Alicia blurted before she could think about the consequences, but it seemed like everybody had similar reactions, though not all of them were able, it seemed, to speak. Jack was looking absolutely terrified, and Carolyn opened her mouth and began to rant about how Jack should have told them that she was a girl and (apparently) that she was having her period. It would have been just a tad imperative to know, but then…Alicia could understand. The girl had probably been terrified that she'd be left behind because she was a liability. Before Carolyn could even finish the first sentence, Jack had dropped to the ground in a sort of crouching fetal position, and Carolyn didn't have the heart to continue chewing her out. She crouched next to Jack and put her arm around hi- HER. This was going to take some getting used to.

"You've got to be fucking kidding me." Alicia turned her eyes to Johns, because she could hear the tone in his voice. The angry tone, the one that could end up hurting people. Alicia decided that, being a man, he couldn't understand it, and interjected angrily.

"It's not her fault. She was scared, and rightly so!" Though she didn't say it out loud, everybody seemed to pick up the 'with you around' that drifted at the end of that sentence, directed right at Johns. Everybody was watching them now, and the tension was practically prickling in the air, making the hair on the back of her neck stand up. Johns seemed to expand, and she could tell that if anything was going down, it was going down now. He turned to her, his gun loose in its holster.

"If you've got something you want to say, Sara, then just say it." Johns was standing squarely, trying to be as threatening as possible, and, surprisingly, not succeeding. Once upon a time, she would have been terrified. Once upon a time before she met Riddick, before she'd become involved in the intricate world of crime inadvertently. She'd faced off with who she had once believed was the most dangerous man in the universe. She'd brushed death not once, not twice, but three or four times. Now she was not the same girl who had run out into the street on a fateful night to help a stranger…no, she was somehow…different.

"Maybe I do, Johns. Maybe I do have something to say." Alicia, for some unknown reason, glanced over at Riddick, who was watching her with something like anticipation, apprehension, and approval, all mixed up into one. "Didn't anybody think to ask how Johns got his bloody nose, when we left the settlement? Why don't you tell 'em, Johns, I know you love telling stories." This drew the attention of everybody, including Jack, who was now quite a bit calmer and riveted on the conversation. Carolyn had stood up now, and was watching the pair of them like one watches two dogs who are growling at each other, tensing to pull them away from one another. Johns, however, was looking quite like he regretted having started this conversation, and mumbled something incomprehensible. Although he hadn't finished what he was saying, Alicia cut across him smoothly.

"Oh, you don't want to tell? Then I'll oblige." Her voice got more confident and mocking as his voice got less bossy. "You see, Johns was having a little bit of a walk in the clouds when I woke up just before we left. Seems he got a little over-confident, or maybe he was just thinking with his dick instead of his brain. But you see – " In the middle of her sentence, Johns suddenly moved violently towards her, gun drawn and at her neck, shutting her up out of pure instinct. He was almost quivering with rage, and had the gun barrel nearly pressing against her throat.

"Shut up. Just shut UP!" Alicia didn't need to say anymore, however, for the damage had been done. Carolyn and Jack were looking at Johns with expressions of pure disgust, and Imam was looking somewhere between disappointed and angry. The little pilgrim boy was the only one who didn't know what was going on, because he couldn't speak English. All Alicia could see, however, was the gun, which, despite the lack of light, gleamed like it was mocking her. For a moment, nobody moved. They were afraid of the gun, knowing that a crazy man would turn on them in a flash if they interfered.

"What are you gonna do, Johns?" Alicia whispered, trying to keep her voice level, so as not to betray her fear. "G-gonna k-kill me? In front of all these witnesses?" Johns hesitated for a moment, and seemed to be deciding whether it was worse to kill then to have a dirty little secret like the fact that he was perverted hanging over his head. After a few moments, the gun dropped, but he was still glaring at her like she was something smelly on the bottom of his shoe. Alicia's muscles slowly released their tension, and she let out the breath she hadn't realised she'd been holding.

"Look, we're wasting light." Carolyn spoke up, and both Alicia and Johns looked over at her, and Alicia had to admit that she'd forgotten there were other people there. "We're going to have to go back…this is too risky…" Alicia stared at her like she'd grown another head, and Johns turned his wrath towards her without difficulty, and Alicia backed out of the limelight, almost literally, and found herself, once again, pressed against Riddick's chest.

"What? You're the one who dragged us out here, Carolyn." Johns seemed eager to find a good reason to expel his anger, and Carolyn's plan was a great one. Carolyn murmured something that sounded like 'I was wrong, okay?', and Johns didn't seem to take much comfort in that. "Come on, Carolyn, nice open area, cool wind on my face, I'm starting to enjoy my fucking self." Now Johns was obviously making no sense, and she knew that he was just making trouble. Johns just wanted to argue, and keep things tense, he didn't want to co-operate, hell, she would have been surprised if he even cared about getting anybody but his own, ugly, egotistical self back to safety.

"Are you high again? Just listen to yourself, Johns." Although Alicia had to agree, slightly, with Johns' point of view, knowing that it would be pointless to return to the ship, she kept her mouth tightly shut. Johns could fight his battles on his own, because nothing short of cash or threat of death would get her to help him. Alicia's attention was distracted by a warm breath suddenly pressing against the hairs on the back of her neck, sending goosebumps up and down her arms.

The drama unfolded in front of her, as all eyes were riveted on the argument that was taking place between Carolyn and Johns, but she couldn't hear it. A hand slid through her hair, gentle and caressing, and she didn't know how he dared do it, when Johns sat so close. The only explanation she had was that he didn't care, or, more likely, wasn't afraid of Johns. In her chest, her heart had skipped a beat, and somewhere in her mind there was a little voice telling her to pull away, to not let him tease her…but she found it quite easy to ignore that voice. Then, just as suddenly as he had begun, he had suddenly released her, and she turned her head to look at him, startled. All that she could see in his eyes was a restrained and masked feeling, and what looked like regret, and she somehow knew that he had been telling himself for a while that he wouldn't do what he'd just started to do. For one, irrational, totally impulsive moment, she considered just running at him, wrapping her arms around his neck, and pressing her lips against his; somehow, this would make everything right. Then, however, both their eyes were drawn to the argument, which seemed to have raised to a new height.

"Listen to her?" Johns said this in a patronising, disbelieving voice, and Alicia wondered what the argument was about now. "She doesn't give a shit about us. Back when we were crashing, you know what she was going to do? She was going to dump us. Dump the passenger bay. Kill us in our sleep." Carolyn was shaking her head, but she could see the fear in her eyes. Johns was, for once, telling the truth. "We are just ghosts to her!"

"Shut your fucking mouth!" Carolyn lunged at Johns, who deftly deflected her to the ground, where she lay defeated. He might have continued, but Imam intervened, his voice shocked and angry. Carolyn lay where she'd landed, and for a minute, Alicia thought she was dead, and was about to round on Johns, who was looking down at Carolyn and laughing. The man was fucking insane. Alicia crouched by Carolyn, and as Johns snapped a flare into light and began to move forward, helped her to her feet. Carolyn pulled away, obviously ashamed to speak with anyone, not after what she'd done. Alicia was angry, certainly, that Carolyn had been so willing to just kill them all to save her own life, and, more importantly, that she had kept it a secret. Then, however, she remembered the secrets that she herself was keeping. For one thing, they all thought her name was Sara, and they certainly didn't know that she was on the run from the law.

Imam and the pilgrim took over dragging the sled, and they all continued forward, as Johns and Riddick walked ahead, almost as if they were pals. A clever illusion, but nothing would put Johns and Riddick together into the same section of a page. They didn't even belong in the same book. So, the procession moved into the entranceway of Hell.

________________________________________  
Alicia, once Riddick and Johns got sort of far ahead of them, walked in front of Imam and the little pilgrim boy, holding up her torch so that they could see directly in front of them, and not trip over unseen obstacles. Johns and Riddick seemed to be chatting nicely, as if they were buddy-buddy, though she couldn't hear what they were saying; they were too far away and the sounds of creatures wailing were constantly drifting from across the sands.

Curiousity got the better of her, and she moved forward, although still slightly turned, holding the torch high so that the flickering light still reached the group behind her. Concentrating hard, trying to ignore the wailing in order to hear their conversation, Alicia moved even farther forward, so that half of her was encased in a ghoulish green light, while the other half was still lit up from her high-held torch. Finally, she managed to pick up what they were saying, hearing the tail end of a sentence from Riddick.

"Sacrifice play," He was saying, while picking his way across the sands with Johns at his heels. "Hack up a body, leave it at the start of the canyon." Her blood froze in her veins, and she considered, for a moment, turning and running to Carolyn, telling her what she'd heard. Then she thought about it, watching them with narrowed eyes. Riddick had led them through thus far, and had shown no sign of wanting to hurt any of them (except perhaps Johns). Why would he suddenly decide to kill someone off as bait?

"Trawl it." Johns was continuing, and it sounded as if he were discussing something as casual as the weather, or where he was planning on going for his vacation. "We've got extra cable in the sled. Drag it forty or fifty feet behind us." Riddick smirked and said something she couldn't quite hear, but that sounded impressed. "Well, I don't want to feed 'em, just want to keep 'em off our scent." Alicia sped up a bit, closing the gap a bit more, though still remaining out of direct sight. Behind her, she thought she could hear Carolyn calling her to slow down, but she ignored it.

"So which one caught your eye…?" Riddick turned his head, looking back at them, and he caught her eye. For a moment, the amused and carefree smile he had on his face faltered, as he looked at the expression on her face. It was a mixture of terror and anger, and she could tell that he knew she had heard what they were saying. Before he could give any sign of whether what she was hearing was true or not, Johns was pulling him back around, muttering at him if he was crazy. If he looked it would be obvious about what they were going to be doing.  
The conversation continued on as such, and Alicia slowly slid back, until their voices were barely audible again, though she caught a sentence here and there. Still pretty far ahead of the group, she started to turn to head back, when one sentence caught her attention, and she swiftly turned back, her eyes widening.

"Alright, enough chatter. You take care of either Sara or the little girl, and I'll keep the rest off your back. Better yet, get rid of both, but if you have to choose one or the other…take Sara. She's bleeding, and she's going to be slowing us down soon. She's a bitch anyway, her and her lies…" That nearly sent Alicia flying at him, ready to claw his eyes out. Me and my lies? What about you, you perverted piece of shit? However, she held herself back as Riddick turned to Johns, with an unidentifiable emotion in his eyes. "What? It's not too big of a job for you, is it?" Johns said mockingly, looking at him irritably, obviously wanting to get the job done quickly.

"No, it's just that…" Riddick turned his full body towards Johns, his shining eyes meeting Johns' blue ones. "I was thinking we might need a bigger piece of bait." Alicia actually let out a long breath of relief, which seemed very loud in the silence that surrounded her. Johns didn't seem to have picked up the subtle threat, since he asked (in a very patronising and sarcastic manner) who Riddick thought would be better. Then there was a long moment in which Riddick and Johns stared into each others eyes, Riddick's never changing from cold and threatening, and Johns' widening as he realised what was about to go down.

Suddenly Riddick lashed out, knocking the gun from Johns' hands, and from behind her she heard Carolyn yelling to leave the sled and run. She nearly obeyed, turning and running a few feet, before stopping and looking back, chewing her lip, not sure what her indecision was about. Behind her, they were scuffling, and Johns had yet to retrieve his gun from where it had fell, with a couple unspent bullets scattered around it. By the time she had turned around to look for the retreating backs of her fellow crewmembers, they were gone. They hadn't realised that she had stopped, and they hadn't looked back, just ran, leaving her behind in the dark. The flare had also gone flying from Johns hand, and lay, giving a ghostly sort of feeling to the scene, illuminating everything with a greenish glow.

Trapped between running into the deadly dark, or running into the middle of an equally deadly fight, Alicia ended up running to a wall and crouching behind it, so that the light from her torch would be hidden from view. From this position, she could see nothing, but she could hear scuffling in the dirt, scrabbling feet, and suddenly Riddick was speaking, obviously to Johns, mocking him.

"One rule." He whispered, and she lifted her head slightly to look over the small canyon wall she was crouched behind, and was met with the sight of Riddick, silhouetted in the greenish light of the flare so that only his eyes were perfectly visible, with a shiv in his right hand. "Stay in the light." Suddenly Johns had moved forward, and slammed his whip into Riddick's legs, knocking him backwards, sending the shiv to the ground. Johns had a hold of it, sending dust up, and made a jab at Riddick's face as he straddled him on the ground. Alicia, without knowing what she was doing, crawled forward, and her hands fumbled with Johns gauge, which had landed not far from her hiding position. Picking up the bullets, she tried to remember all the T.V shows and movies she had seen, envisioning how they always reloaded their guns. Pushing them into the compartment, she cocked it once, and stood, turning back towards the fray.  
Riddick had grabbed on to Johns wrist, even as Johns twisted and sliced at Riddick's face, missing by inches at times, and Riddick was at a bad angle to flip him off of him. Gulping, Alicia hoisted the gun, which was a lot heavier than it looked, and slowly aimed it towards the dust clouds that the two were sending up. At first she aimed towards his head, but then her finger faltered just as she was about to pull the trigger, her human instinct overcoming her wish to both repay a debt, and to get revenge. Alicia hesitated, not sure what to do now, then finally closed her eyes, took a deep breath, then snapped them open, aimed at Johns' leg, and pulled the trigger.

There was a loud bang and the gun recoiled so hard that it knocked her backwards three feet on to her back, with a large bruise already forming on her right shoulder to couple with the pain that was returning in her forearm. Damn cuts. Somewhere not far in front of her, she heard somebody cry out and swear loudly, and she tried to stumble to her feet, so as to not get caught in a vulnerable position. The cloth that had wrapped her leg tightly had now undone itself, hovering for a moment before sliding off and floating to the ground. As soon as the protective cloth was gone, the dust that was rising mingled with the blood, making a part of her leg turn a disturbingly rusty colour. Not only that, but the dust burned as if it were hot coals, and she cried out in pain the moment she tried to put her leg down, which refused to support her weight.

Hobbling towards where she had left her torch, the surroundings were nothing but blurs of motion, which resolved into either Riddick or Johns, as the flare began to burn out in the corner. From somewhere a foot appeared, connecting with her fingers, which instinctively released the gauge she still clutched. It disappeared, becoming just another blur in a swirling world. With only a vague memory of how she'd managed it, she found herself back against the wall, with the torch still burning brightly where she had left it. Behind her, almost all sounds of fighting had ceased, there was just Riddick speaking, and the sounds of a gun reloading.

"You were really bad-ass!" Riddick was obviously making fun of the merc, who, she saw as she raised her head up past the wall, was down for the count, trying to stumble through loading his gauge. Riddick was facing towards her, but didn't seem to see her, and was backing up away from her as the light from the flare slowly began to fade, leaving only the light from her own torch, as well as a very thin beam of light from the top of Johns' gauge. Riddick was continuing, backing up until even she couldn't see him, despite the torchlight. "The badge. The chains. The gauge. I told you to ghost me." Then, for all she knew, Riddick had abandoned her, the surroundings were so dark. With her back against the wall and a fairly certain knowledge that she wasn't going to be able to walk on her own, she waited.

He'll come get me. He has to. He won't leave me behind…will he? Deadly uncertainty filled her as the seconds ticked by in her head. Behind her, there were a few gunshots, then the light on Johns' gauge disappeared. Still she held out her torch, sitting it in front of her feet to keep herself and the immediate area lit up. When the seconds stretched to minutes, and still there was no sound other than her own breathing and the light crackling of the torch, a part of her crumbled. She'd been so sure…so sure that he wouldn't leave her behind, that he cared for her…that she had remained blind to the fact that he was, as always, a murderer. His agenda was inclusive of nobody but himself. Even so, something in the back of her mind had been absolutely certain that he wouldn't leave her behind…and yet he had. For what else could he have done in the long minutes that went by as she stared at the small flames that swivelled and swayed to unheard music.

Alicia couldn't explain it, why he would go to so much trouble to save her life so many times, and then just leave her to die in the dark, alone. She couldn't explain why she'd been so certain that he would this time….or why she felt so disappointed that he hadn't. Pulling her knees to her chest, she hid her face in them, and everything seemed to press down upon her at once, images and faces…

Zeke and Shazza embracing after the crash, having found each other safe and sound…Zeke's blood splattered all over the tomb…Shazza's body flying through the air, still screaming as the hatchlings ate her alive…Imam and his three students, praying to their god, smiling…Imam and his one student left, sitting together over prayer beads, grieving…Paris, drinking his wines and smoking his cigars, fanning himself on his lawn-chair, totally at ease…Paris, disappearing into the night in a panic...Riddick, his arm resting above her head, staring down at her through those goggles…Riddick, disappearing into the dark, never to return…As all these memories and guilt crashed down upon her like a tidal wave, a cold sob escaped her, and a tear went sliding away down her cheek, swiftly followed by another, and then another, until her cheeks were glistening with them.

"Don't you cry." A voice whispered suddenly, and she gasped, raising her head, looking wildly about, but as far as she could see, she was still alone. "Don't you fucking cry, Alicia…promise me you won't cry ever again…" Then he appeared, just a silhouette at the very edge of the torchlight, looking down at her with eyes full of pain. Not physical pain, but…emotional pain. Like you would feel if a loved one were in danger or hurt, and you could do nothing to sooth the pain. Her mouth was half-open in shock, another tear sliding down her cheek unnoticed, but she nodded her head, agreeing to a promise she was fairly sure was almost impossible to keep. Surely she was hallucinating, this couldn't be true…he couldn't be standing here in front of her, with his hand outstretched, waiting for her to take it. He was, however, and she took his hand, letting him pull her gently to her feet, or foot, rather, since the other leg refused to take any more torture like she'd been giving it ever since it had been cut.

"You came back." She said hoarsely, looking up at him, shaking her head. "You came back for me, when you could have left me behind…" Riddick still held her hand, silhouetted by the lights that now lit up his back once more. He looked down at her silently, and there seemed to be something like an inner battle going on behind his eyes, and then suddenly he blinked and turned his head away, past her into the darkness. Alicia had already stooped to pick up the torch, holding it so that the light didn't shine in his eyes, staring up at him.

"We should hurry and get back to the others." Riddick said quickly, turning towards where Carolyn and the others had disappeared. In his eyes, she was sure she could detect something like longing, but then he turned away and it was gone. "Can you walk?" His eyes were down at her leg now, which she had above the ground. Looking down at it, she bit her lip sharply, thinking.  
"I think so…" Alicia took a tentative step forward, only to nearly collapse on to the ground. The word 'only' is used because Riddick caught her under the arms before she could come near the ground. "Or not…" Smiling sheepishly, it faltered as she caught Riddick's worried expression. It was the first time she'd ever seen him obviously display any emotion other than anger or amusement. He sat her down on the ground, and only needed to give her a 'look' when she started to stand.

"Could be infected…" Riddick muttered to himself, and she watched him with wide eyes as he ever so gently examined her leg, rubbing away some of the chalky dust that had accumulated. Looking around, his eyes fell on the torch, and she handed it over, assuming he needed more light. What she didn't expect was for him to blow out the light, yank out the top, then pour what was remaining of the high-grade alcohol on to her leg. As hard as she tried to hold it in, a full-out shriek of pain and surprise let loose from her lips, as it felt like her skin was bubbling and boiling under the alcohol. Her hands scrambled towards the wound, trying to wipe away the substance that was burning her skin away, but he had pinned her down before she could. With his hands pressed against her shoulders and his ankles hooked over hers to keep her from squirming and getting more dust in the cut, it was an awkward position to say the least.

"Stop…squirming…" He said through gritted teeth as he held her struggling form still. "It'll only hurt for a second, but it'll help to keep you from getting more infected…" Seeing as it was the only part of her that could freely move, her hips bucked against him like a wild bronco, obviously with no thought about what sort of instinctive feelings that might, ahem, 'rise up'. After a few more seconds of squirming, she finally gave up, flopping back on the ground, breathing heavily. "Better." He said, breathing just as heavily it seemed, but for entirely different reasons. It was then, it seemed, that it struck both of them how the position would look, should anybody see them. For a few seconds, there was just silence, as he continued to pretty much sit on her, though there was no need…the pain had long since vanished from her mind.

"We've got to find the others." Riddick said suddenly, in a slightly strained voice, getting off her so fast that it looked like he'd been burned. He held out his hand to her and pulled her to her feet. "Think you could…" He pointed at her leg as he looked pointedly at her shirt, and she realised he wanted her to wrap the wound again. She looked down at her shirt with a frown. There wasn't going to be a hell of a lot left by the time she was finished wrapping her own wounds. With a frustrated sigh, she ripped yet another jagged chunk out of it, so that it was only held up by one sleeve and only just covered her right breast decently.

"I'm not going to have any shirt left at this rate…" She muttered to herself, as she leaned down, awkwardly wrapping the cloth around her lightly stinging leg, before tentatively putting her weight on it.

"I could live with that." This comment came without the slightest trace of hesitation, and as she blushed a fiery red, he let out a burst of amused laughter. "Can you walk now?" When she nodded, he turned and headed out at a fast jogging speed, and she struggled after him, still limping slightly. Their only light now was the small flashlights on Riddick's back, which barely illuminated more than a two foot radius in all directions. Slowing down a bit when her leg began to ache again, she came near to the edge of the light, only to have Riddick suddenly swivel and yank her none too gently forward.

"Stay in the light." He hissed, still holding on to her arm. He didn't look at her, but past her, into the dark, watching unseen creatures moving. "I didn't come back for you just to have your ass become dessert for these bastards." With that, he kept moving, although he seemed to go more slowly, as if giving her more chance to keep up.

The trip wasn't long, what with the pace that Riddick was setting, and soon the four fleeing survivors came into sight, with Carolyn in front. One glance at Riddick told her what she should do, and she sped up her pace, catching up with them easily, making it seem as if she had been with them the entire time. Then they stopped, and she gratefully stopped with them, bending down to quickly check if her makeshift bandage had come off. Carolyn was turning in circles like a broken top, obviously trying to figure out the way back to the ship. Suddenly she screamed as her turnings ended up in her nearly banging into Riddick, who had silently appeared out of the dark.

"Back to the ship, huh?" Riddick spoke in a patronizing tone, obviously ignorant of Carolyn's frightened tone as she commanded him to get away from them. "Sitting huddled until the lights go out and you can't see what's eating you, is that the big plan?" Alicia was still breathing rather heavily, trying to catch her breath after keeping up with Riddick over nearly half a mile of hot sand.

"Where's Johns?" Alicia moved her eyes over to Imam, who had posed the question. Riddick was silent for a moment, then shrugged absently and indicated over his shoulder, back the way they'd come. He's dead, the dirty bastard. Alicia silently answered Imam, but decided acting like she knew he was dead would make it just slightly obvious she hadn't been running with them the entire time.

"We're gonna lose everyone out here!" Jack said with a tremor in her voice, as she looked around at the others, as if expecting them to suddenly disappear into the night. Trying to memorize their faces, so that she wouldn't forget them. As Riddick moved past them into the night, with the intent of leading them back to the sled they had carelessly abandoned, Jack stared out into the night, her eyes tearing up.

"Don't you cry for Johns. Don't you dare." Riddick's voice was dark, but not as if he were trying to threaten the child. More as if he were comforting her, in a strange way, and his eyes travelled over to Alicia, although the words weren't directed at her. Shining silver eyes stared into confused green ones for a moment, before realisation dawned and she nodded her head. Reinstating the promise she'd made. 'Promise me you won't ever cry again…' I won't Riddick. I promise. 

((And that's Chapter 7. I hope you guys like it. OH, and IF there are a few quotes mysteriously missing that you can't believe I'd forget…I didn't. They aren't there for a reason. Don't worry, it will all become clear…eventually. ANYWAY. See you guys soon…ish…))


	8. Save Me

((Yay, I was able to connect to the internet again sooner than I thought AND I finished another chapter! Okay, here's an advance warning everyone…there's a new twist. Hope you like it…:) Chapter 9 will take a bit longer.))

They travelled back to the sled, where they made the agreement that a break was needed, and the group seated themselves under the protection of the nightmarish canopy of bones. Watching the frightening shadows that played across the ground, Alicia sat with her legs crossed, staring into the black abyss just outside her circle of light. From a little ways away, she could hear Imam praying with the others, one by one, and she was rehearsing what she would say when he finally came to her. Did she believe in God? Of course. What else could be keeping her safe through all of this nightmare? If she was going to pray, however, she wanted to pray alone. Alicia, though she had generally been friendly, had also always been very shy, preferring to do things alone.

Now, however, she found herself craving the company of one person, and one person only. This person had walked a little ways away from the rest of the group with the small amount of lights that he had, seeming to be craving solitude. Or perhaps solitude was all he had ever known. He had disappeared behind a small canyon wall, and all that could be seen of him was the light, that shone brightly in the darkness, like a lighthouse beacon across a troubled sea. Alicia stood up, and looked out into the darkness, having an inner battle. To go…or not to go? To accept her own feelings, or to still push them away?

Before either of these questions could be answered, Imam had appeared at her left arm, asking if she wished to pray with him. As she looked at the tall man, who still believed so strongly in his faith, even with two of his students already gone, her resolve to decline faltered. After a few moments of stammering indecision, she found herself being coaxed into agreeing. Perhaps God would answer her questions.

Although she felt better once she had prayed, her uncertainties regarding Riddick had not been eased. Just when she had been on the verge of going down to see him, Imam headed off towards him, obviously to offer prayer, and she had sat back down, staring at her hands. She considered confiding in Imam, seeing what his thoughts were, seeing if somehow there was a rule of God that could guide her towards the right path. Then, however, she realised: Imam would not understand. Carolyn and Jack couldn't understand. Not even God could understand the feelings that Riddick inspired, despite the danger that she knew would always be present around him. After all, once people knew that Riddick was out again, there would be more and more bounty hunters on his tail. Mercs had no sense of right and wrong, fair or unfair, they're minds were solely focussed on their own greed. They would kill her to get to him.

Alicia knew all these things, and yet still none of it seemed to give her second thoughts about her own convictions. Without knowing anything about him, she found herself caring for him, feeling sorry for his fate. Surely it couldn't be his fault for what he had become over time. Surely there had been some sort of hate directed at him his whole life that had turned him into a murderer. An injustice, or he could have grown up in a bad environment, where one almost had to kill to survive. These things had been speculated upon ever since Richard B. Riddick's crimes had become infamous, but no concrete information had ever been gathered. The only person who knew the whole truth…was Riddick. He didn't seem partial to disclosing that information to anyone either. So the reasons that Riddick had become the way he had would remain, for the time being, a mystery.

Suddenly the light she'd been staring at for the past half hour began to move, and then Riddick appeared, looking at the four of them where they sat. It was time to move. Standing up, they collected up things, and made sure that everyone had a torch or some other form of light. Their supply of alcohol bottles had dwindled down to three, and Alicia immediately volunteered to go without light. God had spared her this far, despite all the close calls, she hoped he would be as merciful for the rest of the trip. Jack and her would share the small flashlight, while Carolyn, Imam and Suleiman got the torches. Riddick would continue with just the flashlights on his back, which seemed to suit him just fine. So, the six remaining survivors approached the final stretch. The five of them stood behind Riddick, holding up their respective lights, with Alicia sort of hovering in the middle, the only one without an independent source of light. Riddick was crouching, looking out, as if feeling the heartbeat of the planet through his fingertips.

"The only way through, so far as I can see," Riddick said, straightening up and indicating forward with his hand. "Is that way. Straight through. As fast as you can." With that, he turned and pushed through them as if he were leaving them. Alicia's heart skipped a beat, and her eyes followed him, asking the silent question. Her relief showed as he glanced at her, and seemed to smile for a half-beat, reassuring her with that one look.

"What about the fuel cells?" Imam dared to ask, and seemed a little nervous as Riddick gave him a 'look'. There was less than a moment of silence, before Riddick decided to respond.  
"I'll take those." Riddick then began to hoist up the chain, which he had tied together through all of the fuel cells, while Alicia did some mental math. Somebody had said that each of the fuel cells was thirty-five kilograms, and there were five of them, so that meant that he would be dragging…one hundred and seventy-five kilos!

"Are you sure? You're going to be dragging nearly two hundred kilos, maybe Imam or me could help – " Alicia was silenced by a look from Riddick, which clearly stated something along the lines of 'You think I can't drag two hundred kilos?'. Giving a weak apologetic smile, she turned back to the rest of the group. Behind her, Riddick shuffled a bit, pulling on his goggles, and then he was ready.

"Move." He said quietly, but forcefully, and Alicia was surprised when nobody seemed to follow the command, moving forward tentatively. Carolyn started to ask whether he was sure he could keep up, but was cut off as Riddick yelled a lot louder. "MOVE!"

They started to run, Alicia struggling slightly because of her hurt leg, but pretending like it was no problem. Riddick was directly behind them, dragging one hundred and seventy-five kilos and running with it, a feat that most men could not stake claim on being able to do. They're feet pounded the dirt as they ran, with Jack in the center and the rest of them running around her. The walls of the canyon dissolved into blurs, and her heart began to pound in her chest. The last stand. The final stretch. It all came down to whether they could make it from here to the settlement. As adrenaline went flying through her veins, the pain in her leg became secondary, fading into the background. Everything depended on running.  
As they ran, she became aware of something falling from the sky and hitting her on the head. For a moment, she thought that it was raining, until she looked down at one of her hands and saw, not the comforting clear of water, but a disturbing blue colour…

"Don't look up!" She absently heard Riddick yell, but she looked up nonetheless, curiousity over-riding common sense. Carolyn had already slowed, looking up, something like ten feet behind her now. Just outside of the canyon walls, there were thousands of them, flying at each other, fighting, and the blue that fell from the sky was not rain but their blood. Horror suddenly froze her limbs as she stared up at them, as splatters of blood fell on her face and stained her glasses. "Do not look up!" This second warning was much too late, as she heard Carolyn state the obvious. They were killing each other, fighting over their prizes which ran below them, trapped like rats by the canyon walls.

Somewhere to her left, she heard Riddick slam into Carolyn, sending her flying out of the way, and suddenly became aware that something very solid was hurtling towards her from above. "Alicia! Move NOW!" Before she could even think, she lunged forward, landing on her stomach, but still crawling, as two bodies, one on top of the other, fell where she had been frozen. Struggling to stand, someone grabbed the back of her shirt (or what remained of it) and yanked her to her feet, pushing her forward.

As they ran, she was suddenly filled with the horrible realisation that Riddick had called her by her true name in the heat of the moment, and, more important, she had responded to it. For a hopeful moment, she thought perhaps nobody had noticed, but then she saw Carolyn's look of dawning knowledge, and knew that her secret had finally been thrust into the open. They knew who she was, and who she was running from. Fuck. It no longer mattered if she got off the planet alive, because she was practically dead. When it came to Riddick, they showed no mercy, which meant they would probably send her to a triple max slam along with him, a men's slam, and there was no protection there for her. The thoughts of what they would do to her, and it wasn't just the other prisoners she had to fear. She had read horror stories of what happened to woman in prisons, and terror filled her at the very thought of it. Rape was the least of her worries, if it was possible to believe that.

All of these things ran through her mind in the space of a millisecond, and then suddenly they had more pressing matters to worry about. Their path was blocked by a large pile of broken bones, possibly the same pile that they themselves had tumbled in the sandcat. How ironic. Everybody paused and seemed to just move like a wave, milling, unable to think in their panic. Alicia, the second she arrived, dropped to her knees, grabbing at bones and flinging them out of the way, trying to clear a path.

"Move!" Riddick broke everyone out of their stupor and they joined her in moving the bones, pushing things apart. Riddick was the first one through, dragging the fuel cells, and didn't stop as the rest of them started to push their way through, with Jack and Alicia leading the pack. Suddenly there was a pain-wracked scream from behind them, and Alicia whirled, seeing the little pilgrim boy scrambling towards Imam, his ankle clenched in the last death grip of a dying creature. He was ranting in Arabic, obviously terrified, and the torch that had shattered when he dropped it suddenly burst into flame, driving the creature to release him. The little boy was now bleeding, and they were stopping to wrap it up, as they had wrapped up hers.

"Riddick!" Turning, the source of the call came from Jack, who was calling to the still-moving Riddick. "Wait! Riddick!" Riddick didn't even pause, and Alicia realised, with a shock of panic, that he was leaving them all behind. Moving a couple steps forward, Alicia opened her mouth to call, but suddenly was distracted by the shriek of a creature diving at Jack. Jack, apparently with some sort of warning for once, leaped beneath a protruding bone. The creature landed on it, knocking it down and on top of Jack, who started crying out in fear. The creature was jabbing at the rock, breaking pieces off like hail, and Jack was beneath it, terrified, but alive and unhurt. Alicia was frozen for a long moment, staring blankly at the creature, a million things running through her mind, something like indecision, two names running through her mind as her eyes flew from one to the other. 

Riddick…Jack…Riddick…Jack…RiddickJackRiddickJackRiddickJackRiddickJackRiddickJack…Ready to scream from frustration, she finally made a decision and lunged at the flashlight on the ground.

With flashlight in hand, she shone it at the attacking creature, yelling and trying to scare it away, while at the same time hoping it didn't turn on her. It didn't seem to even notice her, continuing to jab at the rock shield, already nearly through to the yelling figure beneath it. Carolyn joined Alicia, waving her torch and yelling, but still the creature took no notice, intent on its next meal. Obviously it had noticed, however, for it suddenly lunged out with it's tail, knocking the flashlight from her hand to smash against the canyon wall in a bright flash. Just when it looked like all hope was lost, the creature leaped from its perch to a much easier target: Riddick. During the chaos, Riddick had paused, turning his head, obviously having a private battle of his own. Now, however, he was turned and with his goggles off, charging at the creature with a loud battle yell.

Breathing heavily, Alicia watched with eyes wide, frozen in spot, as Riddick engaged in the first face to face battle that they'd had with the demonic creatures on the planet. He was barehanded, she realised as her insides filled with ice. No, no, no…don't, you can't…don't fight it, it'll kill you…Disjointed thoughts such as these filled her mind as the fight seemed to melt into slow motion. He was still alive, dodging the blows of the creature, and every time the creature's head jabbed, her heart skipped a beat as she held her breath. Finally, the creature reared it's head back, preparing for a skull-cleaving blow, and then suddenly Riddick was on the move. With movements so fast that even in slow motion they were too fast for her eyes to register, Riddick had his shiv out and was slicing at the creature. The creature was wailing in a cry so pain-filled and hellish that it sounded as if thousands of nails were dragging down a thousand blackboards. Alicia shuddered, and covered her ears instinctively, trying to block out the noise.

Riddick sliced at it's gut, spilling intestines and other organs to the ground by his feet, causing her to gag at the sight. The creature then fell to one side, and Riddick walked over to it, leaning down and grabbing it's head with both hands before twisting it violently with a loud crack. Then the entire clearing fell silent, except for the constant babbling of Suleiman in the corner. Imam was still bandaging his leg, as Carolyn checked on Jack. Riddick looked down at the creature he had just killed, and muttered something under his breath that Alicia didn't quite hear. He glanced at her, standing there, staring at him as the blue blood still fell from the sky like rain from the bowels of Hell. In her hand was clutched the torch that Carolyn had shoved in her hand, so that her hands were free to help Jack to her feet, and Alicia's face was enclosed in an eerie flickering light. He seemed to see the question in her eyes, and he looked away, seeming to be unable to meet her eyes.

He was going to leave us all behind…including me…Alicia shook her head, backing a few steps away, betrayal flowing through her veins, a familiar prickling sensation at the back of her eyes. Only the promise she'd made kept the tears from flowing, and she turned away, her back unnaturally straight, her jaw rigid and her eyes set on Carolyn and the others. Betrayed or not, it was time to keep going.

"Come on. We should keep moving." Everyone looked at her, and she suddenly felt the distrust, aimed solely at her. They knew the truth, and they weren't going to listen to her, not after the lies she'd told them all along. For a long moment, there felt like there was a crevasse between them, as if the ground had mysteriously split apart. On one side, there was Riddick, the criminal, the one that was unsafe. Unpredictable, untrustworthy…the realm of the damned. On the other, there was Carolyn, Imam, Jack and Suleiman. The normal ones, those who were innocent of all crimes. The ones who could be trusted. In the middle there was her, teetering on the edge of the huge crack in the ground, forced to make a choice or she would drop into the center, out of existence, out of memory. She could admit to what she'd done, admit that she'd run from the law, and beg for forgiveness, or she could defend her actions, could refuse to atone for what she believed was the right thing to do. Should she choose to defend her actions, she had a powerful ally in Riddick (at least she hoped so), who would protect her from the law, help her stay hidden. Or at least that's what she'd believed, before realising that he would leave her behind to save himself.

Before any decision could be made, Carolyn had voiced the same sentiments as her, and everyone was moving. Carolyn glanced at her for a half-moment, then moved on. From Carolyn, she sensed nothing but determination. Certainly, the realisation of Alicia's true identity had knocked her off-balance for a few moments, but now her mind was back on track. After all, Alicia had done nothing but help ever since she had arrived, hadn't conspired with Riddick to kill anyone. In fact, Riddick had, in the public eye, acted no differently towards her than anyone else. Alicia was no danger to the rest of them, and Carolyn's main goal was to get all of them home safely.

They continued to travel, Riddick now in front rather than behind them, still dragging the fuel cells, and the rest of them filed along behind. They were about to enter a very narrow part of the canyon, and Alicia was starting to lag behind, her legs burning. Just as she was about to speed up again to catch up with the group, there was a loud screech, and just as she was whirling to attempt to protect herself, claws wrapped around her ankles, dragging her to the ground with a scream. She could hear everybody turning around, in shock, but it was Riddick who reacted first. Although she couldn't see him, she could hear him charging across the ground, shoving them all out of his way, his eyes on her. Just as he was about to reach her, the creature took off, her back leaving the ground until she was hanging upside down, and Riddick's figure was dwindling, slipping away.

"ALICIA!" Riddick, yelling at her from the ground, and her eyes travelled down to him. His arm was still stretched out, reaching for the tiny dot of light that was her torch, that she had managed to cling to, despite her panic, knowing that light was life. Reaching out, trying to stretch his arm to reach her hands. Half of her wanted to yell back to him, so that he would know how she felt before it was too late. Even as she opened her mouth to call, her throat closed up, not letting the words pass her lips. Then he was gone, out of sight by the canyon walls. It was too late. Obviously the creature had seen what Riddick had done to the other creature, and was getting far out of the way before enjoying its meal. Alicia felt desperation clawing at her chest, constricting her breathing, and she could feel the creature starting to drop it's altitude, landing to finish her off. Her glasses had gone tumbling off when the creature had yanked her upside down, falling to land at Riddick's feet, not that she needed them. She preferred to not see what was going to kill her, then feast on her breathless corpse. Closing her eyes, she started to pray, not knowing why she did it, when it was so obvious that she was finished.

Just as her final words were leaving her lips, there was a screech that came, not from the creature that carried her, but something else. Then suddenly her creature jolted violently to the side, and before she could figure out what was going on, she was free-falling, twirling in the air for what felt like an eternity before landing with a very painful thud on her back. Having released the torch sometime in the fifteen or twenty feet that she'd fallen, she saw it falling through the air to her left, and closed her eyes, bracing for the shattering sound that would indicate her loss of hope. Above her, she could hear two sources of screeches, obviously two creatures fighting over their prize; namely, her bruised and broken body.  
Somewhere to her left, she heard, not a shattering, but a muffled thud, and her eyes snapped open to see a flickering light against the sky. She could almost hear the angelic chorus in the background. It didn't shatter! Against her back, she could feel, thankfully, soft sand, rather than hard bone or rock. The deep, soft sand had probably saved her from a broken back, not to mention from rupturing every inner organ in her body. Everything hurt, especially her legs, which had once again been clawed, re-opening wounds left, right and centre as well as creating new cuts. Her back was slowly throbbing, and, judging by the fiery pain in her left shoulder, she'd at least dislocated it, if not broken it.

A few moments passed as the flickering torchlight continued to wash over her, possibly saving her from being the prize of whoever the victor had been in the airborne fight. For a long moment, she just sat staring up at the sky, praying to whatever higher power had decided to save her from certain demise once again, thanking it over and over again. Finally, she felt the strength to move, first moving her right arm, pushing herself up to a sitting position with a groan. It hurt like hell, and she nearly just flopped back down to let herself die in slow agony. Alright, mental check…right arm: Generally undamaged. Left Arm: Possibly dislocated. Right leg: Clawed up, but unbroken. Left Leg: Possibly sprained ankle. Her mental check continued as such, and her final assessment was that, if she made it to the skiff, she would live from her injuries.

Crawling over, her hand clenched on the torch that was keeping her safe, and then she pushed herself to her feet, staggering. She was bruised, she was in pain, but she was alive. Clenching the torch in front of her, she looked around her, trying to gain some sort of bearings. The creature had not flown far, and had flown straight without turning. If this was true, then the canyon was somewhere to her right, which meant she had to turn around and walk in the opposite direction of the way she was facing. Eventually, she would have to turn left to get to the settlement. Somewhere in the back of her mind was a little voice saying that there was no way she could find it in the dark, at least not alone, but she ignored it and started valiantly forward, limping, and in pain. The only thing keeping her going was the knowledge that if she didn't at least try, she was dead anyway. With this thought, she forced each foot forward, one at a time, trying to ignore the hungry screeches to either side, waiting for her to fall.

She'd been walking for nearly half an hour when the drops of blue blood that had been continually hitting her head suddenly intensified. She might not have noticed, except that this liquid was cold, not warm like the blood had been. Lifting her head hopelessly, she stared at the clear liquid disbelievingly. In her hand, the torch sputtered lightly and she immediately tried to shield it with her hand, ignorant of the heat. Shaking her head, she stared at the sky, unable to believe that this was happening. Slipping slightly, she fell to her knees in despair, and screamed out in frustration, her voice echoing around the empty landscape.

"Why do you keep saving me only to try and kill me?" She yelled up into the sky, obviously directing the rhetorical question to the higher power that seemed to enjoy toying with her life. In her hands, the torch sputtered, and the sand that she'd been tirelessly travelling across was turning to mud, and her knee slipped from under her, sending her to fall on her side. With a small cry as something jabbed into her right hip, she gasped, suddenly remembering something. Pushing herself back to her knees, she jammed her hand into her right pocket, and laughed out of sheer disbelief and joy as her hand closed over the metal object. Yanking it out, she stared at the little pistol, that had sat in her pocket for so long that it had simply melted into her own being. So long that she had forgotten it was there, it had become such a normal weight.

There were six bullets in the chamber, and as she stared at the torch that was still sputtering, threatening to die at any second, she stood up, and raised her head, trying to figure. She didn't know where the others would be, but maybe…just maybe…Riddick would see or hear…. Staring up into the sky, she raised the gun, pointing it directly upwards into the sky, imagining the higher power that had toyed with her life for so long. If she concentrated hard enough, she could make out a leering face above her, and she smirked, then pulled the trigger, aiming right into that smile. The pistol recoiled lightly, and there was a loud bang that echoed all around her landscape. She pulled the trigger again, and different faces materialized and shattered above her with each gunshot.

Boom…Johns face, gauge raised…Boom…The cops who had appeared at her door so long ago…nameless faces appeared above her, representing various areas of the justice system, until she had one bullet left. Then her eyes were pulled down by the sounds of creatures around her. Shoving the gun into her pocket, her fingers clenched the torch, and she stumbled forward, the rain splattering around her, the mud sliding under her feet. Finally, she had to stop, and her feet nearly dropped from underneath her as she looked around, searching for some sign that her signal had been heard.

And the rain poured down around her.

((Voila! Cool? Un-cool? Review please! Do give me a bit of a reprieve if it totally sucks, I have been in a car for nearly a week straight...Love you all! -hugs and kisses- :-P See you all soon))


	9. Return From The Dead

((Chapter 9! I hope you guys like this chapter, it was done in a bit of a hurry (I wanted to get my ideas down on paper before they flitted away) and in a car. Oh, by the way, near the end of this chapter, you shall see the reason one of our favourite lines was omitted from an earlier chapter. More plot twists :-P Hope you all like it!))

She remembered the dream, as she crouched on her knees, trying to shield the torch from the rain with her body. She remembered the rain, the torch…and the terror. She remembered the then-unknown creatures that had been stalking her in her dream-world, only to be forgotten at the first hint of light in the morning. The images that had come afterwards were unclear, blurry and out of order. There had been a light, hadn't there? Another light, coming out of the darkness just when there'd been no hope left. The memory brought a small spark of hope, but then it was drowned by a fact of reality that refused to be forgotten: It had been a dream. There had been no basis in reality…and yet, the sheer fact that she'd dreamt of this place long before even being near it spoke of a vision.

Tears were threatening on the edge of her vision every second, but she forced them back, fulfilling a promise that she'd made to a person she may never see again. Raising her head, she looked out into the darkness, cold water dripping down her face, trying to will him to appear. Where are you when I need you the most? Her mind asked, and she let her head drop again, closing her eyes and pushing back the tears again. In her mind's eye, she could see him looking down at her as she sat in the dark, and his voice echoed through her mind. What are you doing? Giving up without a fight after all you've been through? On your feet! 

With no clear memory of doing so, her feet found their way beneath her, propelling her to a standing position as she held her spluttering torch in her hand. Have to keep moving…it can't be much farther… With a bit of a stumble, she forced her right foot forward, then her left, and soon she was walking (or stumbling, more accurately). Every time her mind even considered stopping and just giving up, Riddick's face and voice would suddenly appear in her mind again, reprimanding her, spurring her forward. He wasn't even around and he was saving her life again. Ironic. Keep me going, Riddick…lead me to where you are…

At one point, her feet slid from under her in the mud and she fell straight to her stomach, the torch spluttering as it slipped out of her hands. The voice in her head tried to push her to stand, but she couldn't move past reaching out to pull the torch closer to her. The voice in her head suddenly went silent as she officially gave up, staring hopelessly at the darkness in front of her. There was no way she could make it, she didn't even know where the settlement was, not that she would be able to see it in the dark. For all she knew, she had walked right past it already.

"Alicia!" Oh, go away you stupid voice…you aren't real, you're just part of my mind…Closing her eyes, she listened to the torch sputtering more and more, the light about to go out. "Alicia!" That voice sounds so real…Suddenly she thought she heard faraway footsteps pounding the muddy ground, and, despite the fact that she was fairly sure she was having auditory hallucinations, she cracked open her eyes to blink out at the darkness. Or…what used to be darkness.

There was a light, moving through the night, moving back and forth, illuminating a figure. I'm seeing things…it can't be real. Despite her mind saying this, she cracked open her lips, moistening them slightly before calling out into the night hopelessly. One word, one name. Riddick… The light disappeared behind a rise, as if responding to the words, and then her eyes slid closed again, as the flickering light that was her torch finally sputtered one last time…then went out. She braced herself for the certain death on the horizon, knowing that the light she had seen must have been a hallucination.

God…please let Riddick lead the others safely back to the skiff…don't have them endure the same fate as mine…As she prayed into the heavens, her shoulder throbbed and she absently pulledher armcloser to her body, cradling it, as if to save it from more pain. Please forgive all my sins…and the sins of those who came before me to your domain…Zeke's image flickered through her mind…and finally…please…forgive Riddick. Let him, when his time comes, find me in heaven…if you can't do that, then you must not be the God I thought you were. Unable to come up with anymore prayers as her mind slipped in and out of consciousness, she finally gave in to the surrounding darkness. Goodbye…Riddick…

In something like a dream, her entire life flitted by in an instant, leaving no space for reflection or repenting. Just as the final, deadening darkness began to close in on her, there was sudden, dazzling life. A disembodied voice, a gentle touch…dream-world intertwining with reality, threads of pure, untainted light pushing at her, not allowing the darkness to fall in, not allowing her to give up the joyous state of being alive. Images of life that could be, of laughter, dancing, happiness and tears of joy. Of holding hands, kisses, and, most importantly, love. Love was pulsing at her mind, as if from an outside source, not letting her let go. Not yet. Unfinished business…

From somewhere that felt like far, far away, she heard footsteps. Running, and then there was a sharp intake of breath. Another dream…why do you mock me, even when I'm about to die? The footsteps seemed to stop right by her still form, about to be ripped apart by monsters.

"Alicia…?" The name was tentative, a question, as she heard the owner slide to his knees in front of her, and felt hands gently turning her over on to her side, her hair sliding over her face. "Come on, Alicia, don't you dare fucking give up…come on, give me a sign you're still with me…" It seems so real…could it be? Fear clenched at her, warning her that if she opened her eyes, she might meet eyes with, not a saviour, but thousands of razor-sharp teeth about to chomp down on her. Then the memory of the voice, desperate for a sign, came to her mind, and she forgot her fear. Pushing all of her energy into it, she cracked open her eyes maybe a millimetre and was rewarded with a blurry image of light, and a figure kneeling by her side.

"Okay, stay with me…stay with me…I'm gonna get you out of here." Closing her eyes in an attempt to clear her vision, she opened them again, a bit wider, and couldn't help but be disbelieving of what she saw. Riddick, his goggles off, drenched in rain, with raindrops dripping off his head, and his silver eyes displaying distress, worry, and, remarkably, some kind of intense disbelief of his own. Overtop of it all, she saw joy, joy at finding her alive, and this spurred her on somewhat. I can't believe it…I can't believe it…he's really here…it's not a dream…As she went on with this inner monologue of disbelief, she felt hands slide under her knees and upper back, gently lifting her from the cold and muddy ground, cradling her like a child.  
"You came for me…" Her voice was hoarse from the cold and the rain, barely audible as she opened her eyes again, staring up into the shining silver ones that looked back at her, and she could see a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. In the chaos, it seemed like the walls around Riddick had come crashing down, revealing thousands of hidden emotions as he looked down upon her, half-concealed in darkness, half-wrapped in a halo of light.

"Hey, like I said. I didn't save your ass so many times just to have you become a meal for these bastards." He said, and she heard that the gruff tone was still there, though masked as if he was trying to sound gentle. "Don't talk too much…we got to make it back to the skiff, it's not far. You were almost there." She thought she could hear something like appreciation in his voice, as if he were proud of her to have gotten as far as she did. It was because of you…even if you weren't really there, you were there in my mind. She thought to herself, and she slid her uninjured arm around his neck to give him less work to hold her up. The arm she thought was dislocated, she held against her stomach tightly, and tried not to look out into the darkness that they were walking into.

"I heard your signal." When she looked up at him quizzically, he clarified, smiling slightly. "The gunshots. I heard them just as I was about to leave. Strong survival instinct…I admire that in a woman. Though you shouldn't have fired them all at once." Alicia raised an eyebrow, looking at him, trying not to smile at the absurdness of the situation. He was carrying her, holding her close as if he were afraid to let go, and he was criticizing how she chose to spend her signal bullets. If she were not so tired, she might have laughed at it all. As it was, she was tired, in fact she was fighting to not slip back into unconsciousness. Resting her head against his chest, she felt her eyes drooping, and his arms were just so warm…

"Hey! Don't you fucking dare!" She felt herself get violently shaken, and she jolted back into consciousness, blinking into the darkness, disoriented for a moment. "I take back what I said. Talk. Talk as much as you can, rant and babble for all I fucking care, but stay awake! If I have to, I'll make you walk!" She stared blankly up at him, not understanding what was so important about staying awake, but hearing the danger in his voice. So she shifted, still leaning her head against his chest, and started to talk.

She'd never remember exactly what she talked about, but it seemed to flow as soon as she opened her mouth. It seemed as if she talked about everything: Her family, her childhood, her hopes, her fears, her dreams…the one thing that her mind strayed away from was Riddick and her feelings regarding him. Riddick didn't stop her or interrupt her and he seemed to be genuinely listening, though every so often something that only he could see would distract him out in the darkness. It seemed like they were walking for a long time for the skiff being 'not far', but it was made longer, she found out later, by a detour they had to take around a large grouping of creatures.

They walked for perhaps a half-hour, perhaps more, she had long ago lost track of time, and a couple times her head would droop slightly and her talking would trail off as she felt sleepiness clench at her again. Every time this happened, Riddick would shake her awake, and she vaguely marvelled at how strong he was, that he could carry her all this way without a sign of strain or exhaustion. He would ask her some vague question and she would go off on another babble, changing topics so often that one could never quite follow the trail. Just as her eyes were drooping closed again, she was aware of light over the hill. Curious, she pulled her eyes open and shifted herself, trying to see over the hill.

"That's the skiff, powered up and ready for take-off." Riddick said, the first time he'd spoken for quite a while now, and she could almost hear the smile in his tone. "I told you I was almost off the planet when I heard your signals." That had been close…real close. A few minutes later might have made the difference between creature chow and being rescued. Frightening thought. Closer to the skiff, she requested that Riddick let her walk. She didn't want the others to see her being carried, like a weakling, though of course it would make sense after being attacked by creatures yet again that she may have a few difficulties walking. Nonetheless, she staggered forward, with Riddick supporting her until they reached the ramp and she climbed up, expecting startled gasps and people asking if she was alright.

Instead, she was greeted with silence. The skiff was empty apart for her and Riddick, who didn't seem to notice anything unusual. On the contrary, he started to close the door. There was no way…they weren't dead, it was impossible. Riddick had made it all the way, surely he'd led the others as well?

"Riddick…where are the others?" Riddick glanced at her as he walked by, but didn't answer, just kept walking. "Riddick! Where are the others? Where are Jack, Imam, Carolyn and Suleiman?" Still no answer, and she could see how herefused to look at her, busying himself at the front, pressing buttons andchecking a shocked pause, she made the connection. "You left them behind."

Backing slowly away, her hand fumbled with the switch on the wall, pulling it to 'Open', so that the ramp began to move slowly towards the ground. Her eyes were accusing, and she backed away down the ramp, slowly, and she stood at the bottom, in the mud and rain, and he slowly moved forward so that he was standing at the top.

"We're going to go get them." She whispered, watching him, expecting acknowledgement, or argument, or something of that nature. She got silence, once again, as he continued to stare at her, now with his goggles back on. She looked down at her hand, where she held a flashlight that she had picked up somewhere on the skiff. Her head was pounding, and she suddenly had the mild revelation that she likely had a concussion from when she'd fallen to earth. That would explain the mysterious sleepiness and Riddick's concern about it. Riddick hadn't moved, was still watching her, obviously with no intention of helping her go to get the crew. She continued to back away, and flashed the light around, orienting herself.

"Why should we?" Riddick had finally spoken, and she turned to look at him. He was now halfway down the ramp, looking at her, his head tilted slightly. "Why should we help them when we know that they're going to turn us both in as soon as they get the chance?" Her resolve faltered for a moment, and she looked at her feet, then brought her face up again, and shook her head, staring at him.

"They wouldn't. They wouldn't turn us in after what we've done. That's something a fucker like Johns would do, not someone like Carolyn or Imam…and Jack! Jack, she's what, twelve, thirteen years old? Jack looks up to you, she shaved her head, she made herself goggles like yours…you're her fucking idol. Does that mean nothing to you?" There was silence as she shook her head slowly, and tried not to cry. "Please…just come with me…" Alicia pleaded, staring at him, afraid to go into the dark alone, without the certainty that he would be waiting for her when (or if) she got back. Riddick was silent for a moment, seeming to be contemplating what she'd said.

"It means something. Not enough for me to risk dying for them. I'm sorry…but I will leave them here." Alicia shook her head, backing away, until she was almost totally out of the light. She shook her head, and turned, limping away, with no idea as to what she was going to do alone. Every tiny sound terrified her, but she held her head high, trying not to show her fear.  
She knew the way that Riddick must have been talking about when they were in the canyon. It was just over that rise, and she had no choice. Nothing in her body would allow her to leave people behind on this hellhole of a planet, not after all they'd been through. Alicia had a feeling that Riddick wouldn't have killed them outright, even he had harboured a tiny bit of a caring for Jack and the holy man. Carolyn had trusted Riddick, and she had a feeling that Riddick would not have obviously betrayed that trust. He would have perhaps given them a place to 'hide', then left without a word. She was sure they weren't stupid, they'd figured it out after a few minutes, but still, it was more humane than simply killing them.

All of these thoughts had carried her to the bottom of the small hill before the canyon, and she turned over her shoulder. The ramp to the skiff had closed, and Riddick had not exited. For a moment she couldn't believe it, but then she forced herself to turn and continue on. If Riddick wouldn't help her, then she would do it alone. What if Riddick isn't there when you get back? Asked a sly (but logical) voice in her head, and she found that she had no answer. And yet, she continued up the rise, her vision blurred by a mixture of rain and tears, and in her distraction, she didn't even pay attention to where she was walking. Which was probably why her foot went flying out from under her, and she went spiralling back down the hill, her flashlight going flying out of her hand, and mud going everywhere. Landing back down at the bottom, she cried out in sheer pain. Her shoulder, which she'd forgotten about when she'd started out on this foolhardy mission, was now throbbing in fiery pain again, causing sparks to erupt in front of her eyes. Something seemed to snap back into place, however, and the pain went from a throb to a dull ache.

Swearing to herself, she lifted herself up off the ground. Only to come face to face with a creature. Literally, face to face, her nose was right at it's nose, less than three inches away. For a long moment she was frozen in spot, her breath coming fast, and she tensed, knowing there was no way she could run fast enough to outrun it, even if she hadn't had a slightly sprained ankle. But it didn't move to attack her, just seemed to stare right at her, as if waiting for her to move. Was it mocking her, lulling her into a false sense of security before it attacked? Did these things even have the intelligence to do that? Flashlight…where's the flashlight! Sparing a quick glance around the ground, she saw the flashlight…sitting ten feet away from her, far out of reach. Shit. 

"Don't. Move." Alicia very nearly jumped out of her skin, and cracked her neck painfully she swivelled it around so fast. The source of the voice couldn't be seen anywhere in the dark, but she could recognize it anywhere. Riddick was standing somewhere in the shadows, and now that she looked, she could see the skiff ramp had been opened again. Perhaps he'd heard her cry of pain, or perhaps he'd had second thoughts, she didn't know, she didn't care, the mere fact that he was there made her feel better. The creature had possibly heard Riddick's voice, for it began to turn it's head towards where she thought she'd heard it. It didn't even get a quarter of the way, for Riddick attacked from out of nowhere, breaking it's neck with a swift twist and a sharp crack.

"You know, you do that very effectively." Alicia pointed out absently, with a small smile, as she limped over to her flashlight and scooped it up, shining it around so that she could at least see him. Riddick just appeared, almost out of thin air, in the space directly in front of her, looking down at her with a protective aura around him. He inclined his head slightly as if shrugging off the compliment, then snapped on the lights that had mysteriously made their way on to his back again.

"You look very sexy covered in mud." He said, and she flushed a bright red, not sure if he was joking or not and for some reason that made him very attractive to her. Seeming amused by her reaction, he pointed back towards the open skiff. "Go back to the skiff. I said I'd be able to leave them behind…I could never leave you behind." With that, he turned and sprinted off up the hill and disappeared. Left standing there with her mouth half-open in shock, she suddenly became aware that she was shivering (although she'd been shivering almost constantly for the past hour) and turned and started to limp-jog her way back to the skiff. As she finally approached the ramp, she took a moment to rest, breathing heavily, standing in the light that the skiff provided.

"Well, well, well, so you survived hell, just like me, did you?" Alicia didn't look up, staring at the ground in front of her. No. It can't be. It can't be him, he's dead, Riddick killed him…it can't be…As she finally raised her eyes, however, she saw that it was, indeed, him. Johns stood in the opening of the skiff; torn up and with only a bleeding stump where his left foot used to be, but very much alive. "Thought I was dead, didn't you?" He took a step-hop on to the ramp, using the long bone in his left hand as a cane. She became very, very much aware of the gauge that he still held at his side, cocked and ready.

"Johns…how the..." Alicia took a step back, the flashlight still clenched tightly in her right hand, watching him as he stood in the center of the ramp, smiling evilly down at her. "You were dead…you were dead, there's no…there's no fucking way you could be alive…it's a hallucination. It has to be a hallucination, a side-effect of my concussion…" By this point she was mostly talking to herself, but Johns – the hallucination of Johns, rather (or at least she hoped) – interrupted her monologue smoothly.

"You know, you could say that it's all thanks to you, ALICIA." He took another step down the ramp and she saw him clench the gauge tighter. Alicia listened out into the night, hoping that Riddick or the others were coming, but all she heard was the falling rain and the faraway shriek of a feasting creature. "If you hadn't left your torch behind with just enough alcohol to get a bit of a torch, I never would have found my gun in the dark, after one of those fucking demons knocked it out of my hand. If I hadn't found my gun, I would have never had the bullets to kill the next fucker who tried to knock my gun away. Plus I would have never had enough light to find my way back here without it." Here Johns took a moment to just smirk at her and give a sarcastic bow of gratitude towards her.

Alicia was suddenly aware of the familiar weight in her back pocket, which seemed to make itself known whenever she was in dire need. The world around her had a fuzzy edge to it, and she was suddenly uncomfortably aware that she did not have her glasses anymore. They were, for all she knew, still sitting where they'd landed back at the canyon. They did her little good there, however, and she prayed that her eyes were good enough without, so that when she needed to, her bullet would find it's mark. There was only one bullet, which meant only one chance. If she missed, she was likely dead, and if she hit, she would become a killer. Neither option was favourable, but if she had to, she'd very easily choose killing Johns over dying.

"You know, it's also your fault that I lost my foot though." Johns was continuing, nearly at the bottom of the ramp now, and she was suddenly wondering how he could still be walking. He must have lost a hell of a lot of blood from that wound. "Riddick would have never tried to kill me if you hadn't told them about my…what shall we call it? 'Lack of discretion'? And because he tried to kill me, I had to navigate my way through the dark on my own, and the son of a bitch that got my foot snuck up on me. If I were still with the group, I would be just fine and dandy, now wouldn't I?" One more step, and he was only a few feet in front of her.

Alicia was now in fear for her life, knowing that Johns was mentally unstable now, if he hadn't been before. For one thing, he obviously had gone nearly a whole day without his precious morphine, so he was in serious withdrawal. That coupled with the mental trauma of losing his foot, and of having to navigate alone in the dark, and you've got one seriously unstable man. It wouldn't be so bad, except he had a gun in his hand, which made it twenty million times more dangerous.

"You know, I used all of my bullets. All of my bullets except one. You want to know why, Alicia?" He raised up his gun and the one unspent bullet, and made a great show of loading it into his gun. "So that I could use it to kill you, you little bitch. You cost me my foot! You cost me my reputation! I'm going to make sure nobody else hears the story of 'Johns the pervert'! NOBODY! Nobody's going to miss you. You're a convict. All they'll need to know is that you died resisting capture and there'll be no more questions asked." With that, he started to raise his gun, and suddenly she found herself moving. The flashlight hit the mud with a wet splat as two gunshots echoed into the rain.

((CLIFFHANGER! I know, I'm cruel, but I wanted to use my chance…:-P Have I included too many plot twists? Is it too much? Please, just tell me, I can take the criticism! Next chapter…MAY be the last one. I'm not sure. Depends. Probably not though. Before you ask, YES, this will be extending past the end of Pitch Black, but keep in mind that I haven't seen Chronicles of Riddick yet (but I will be soon!) so yeah, hope you enjoyed it!))


	10. Can't You See I Love You?

((Haha! I made you all wait! Now you shall find out the fate of Alicia:-) I'm so afraid I went out of character in this chapter…please forgive me if I did.))

Blood mingled with the rain on the ground, a disturbingly vivid red against the dark ground. For a long moment, neither party seemed to be sure whose blood now stained the ground. Or had both bullets hit their targets? Johns stood at the bottom of the ramp still, but his smile seemed to falter as he lowered his gun and looked down at himself. There, just below his collarbone on the left, his shirt had stained a bright red in a wide circle that dripped down in long streaks. As he began to sway on the spot, his smirk fell from his face, replaced by a look of shock.

"You shot me…" The words sounded as though they were coming from another man's mouth, they were so disbelieving and weak where he had once been confident and bossy. After looking blankly at the spot where Alicia had been standing only moments before, he stumbled and fell forward on to his face, his gun and cane both falling to the ground next to him with a wet thud; a fitting end to a horrible man. Across the mud, just inside the light, Alicia stood against one of the metal buildings, still clutching the gun. Her knuckles were deathly white on the trigger, the trigger she had pulled and ended someone's life. It looked as if she might be dead, she was staring blankly at the fallen form without blinking, her eyes looking glazed.

The only sound in the clearing was the slow tapping of the rain against the ground. Then there was a long, ragged breath, and Alicia's legs buckled underneath her, sending her to her knees on the ground, bleeding from a deep gash in her upper right arm, but otherwise alive and unharmed. Ironies upon ironies, it had been her own gun that had saved her life. When she'd fired, she had been unprepared for the recoil, which had knocked her off balance, so that she slipped slightly to the left. Just enough so that the bullet had only grazed her arm rather than ripping into her lung or shoulder. In the trauma, her arm had yet to feel the hellish pain that would probably consume her entire right arm, possibly temporarily paralyzing it if it were severe enough.

Time moved like a snail as she continued to stare at the body, the rain still pounding around her. Her hair was plastered to her face, dripping tiny rivers of water down her cheeks and face, but she didn't seem to notice. I killed a man…I killed a man…I killed him…I'm a murderer, I killed a man…Her thoughts couldn't get off this broken-record style of thinking, the same messages repeating over and over in her brain, drowning out all other thoughts. Then, suddenly, a voice broke through (that sounded remarkably like Riddick's): He was going to kill you. You did the right thing. The words that had been replaying over and over again in her head faltered, uncertain, and there seemed to be an inner dialogue going on between her own inner voice, and the other inner voice that sounded like Riddick. He was going to kill me…right…So it was self-defense…that's right…so it was the right thing? He was a motherfucker anyway, he deserved to die. I guess so…

Becoming more aware of reality, she was suddenly accosted with the sounds of running footsteps, and was vaguely aware that it probably meant Riddick was coming back. Turning her head blankly, she was greeted with, not Riddick, but Imam and Jack. Where's Carolyn? She thought vaguely, staring at them, but they didn't seem to see her at first.

"Oh my god! Johns? It can't be, he was dead…" That was Jack, while Imam tried to shift her into the skiff. It was rather difficult, considering Jack was staring at the body with a kind of morbid fascination, though they both seemed more than glad to be at the skiff. Suddenly Imam looked up and saw her, and Alicia was hit with the vague idea that she must have looked like she'd been literally brought back from the dead. Her face was pale as if all her blood had been sucked from her cheeks, and she was bloody and cut everywhere. That coupled with the fact that they'd all watched her get carried away by a creature, probably was the reason that they all backed away suddenly. "Alicia…? It can't be…"

"I killed him…b-but he was g-going to k-kill me, so it was r-right…" Alicia took a moment to realise that the voice was issuing from her mouth, the detached feeling was so complete. Her eyes turned to Imam, who was staring at her with his mouth half-open in shock. "Right?" Imam seemed to hesitate, and then moved forward, and gently reached for her arms, helping her to her feet. He let Alicia lean on him as he half-dragged her towards the skiff.

"Come, my child, you need rest…" Imam said, and Alicia was suddenly hit with the knowledge that Riddick was nowhere to be seen. "Get on the skiff…" Imam was speaking to her, but Alicia wasn't listening, twisting and turning, trying to see into the darkness.

"Wait…wait! Where's Riddick? Where's Carolyn?" The knowledge that Riddick was missing was more than enough to bring her out of the trance that had seemed to give a fuzzy sensation in her brain. Jack and Imam looked at her, startled, as she pulled away, trying to walk on her own despite her sore ankle. "WHERE'S RIDDICK!" As if answering her question, a deep-throated yell of pain sounded out in the darkness, followed by a higher-pitched cry that must have come from Carolyn. No…no, no no, don't do this to me, God!

With no further words to the other two, she leaped back off the ramp into the mud, ignoring the body as if it were nothing more than mud on the ground. Grabbing the flashlight from the ground, she sprinted off (as best she could, anyway) into the darkness, searching for Riddick or Carolyn, calling their names, for some reason connecting that if she found Carolyn, she would find Riddick. No, no, don't be dead ,he can't be dead, he can't die…

As she approached where she was sure she'd heard the yells of pain, she screamed as suddenly something came flying out of nowhere, slicing her arm. It would have hit her stomach, had her reflexes been but a millisecond slower. In front of her, the source of the danger fell back down into the pile of large metal cans, sending them scattering with loud metallic thuds. The sound of the rain splattering against them echoed in her head as Riddick came up swinging again, obviously thinking he was still being attacked.

"It's me! Riddick! It's me, stop it!" Miraculously, she managed to grab the arm with the shiv in it and divert it slightly, inches away from slicing into her gut. He was obviously disoriented, staring at her as if he didn't recognize her, his eyes wild and unfocussed. It was obvious that his leg was bleeding badly, but he was alive. Just as it seemed he had figured out who she was, his feet slid from under him, sending him falling forward, knocking her sideways before falling face-first in the mud. "Riddick! Get your ass up! Get up! Riddick!" Not realising that she was screaming the words like a madwoman, she dropped to her knees, grabbing at his arms, trying to yank him to his feet. Suddenly another pair of hands grabbed his other arm, and Alicia looked up, meeting the blue eyes of Carolyn.

In her hand was what appeared to be one of the bottles that had originally held Paris' alcohol, but now it was filled with squirming blue insects, luminescence in the dark. Obviously, these were the reason that they hadn't been dead when Riddick had retrieved them. Her back looked like it had been torn up badly, and her leg was bleeding almost as much as Riddick's, but she was still standing. After a moment of staring at each other, they both pulled up, and managed to pull a semi-conscious Riddick to his feet. Carolyn swung one of his arms over his shoulder, and Alicia mimicked the motion. Like bizarre contestants in a nightmarish three-legged race, they set forward, Riddick half-walking, half-stumbling between them, and Carolyn and Alicia holding up their respective lights. Alicia's flashlight was the strongest of the two, but it had a very concentrated beam, while Carolyn's shone in all directions, so that the danger level was pretty much equal between them.

Her right arm was still bleeding freely, acting like a huge neon sign in the darkness that said 'HERE I AM, EAT ME!', but she barely noticed the pain. Fear and adrenaline rushed through her, and she could hear very little over the sound of her blood pumping in her ears. Just as they were only about five minutes away from freedom, there was a screeching sound in the darkness, obviously headed straight towards them. This seemed to spur Riddick into action as he suddenly dropped, but both of them pulled back, and, as a result, only Riddick fell out of danger. Alicia looked over and met Carolyn's eyes for a long moment.

In Carolyn's eyes, she saw, for the first time, fear. Where once had been cold determination to get them all home safe, there was fear and desperation. Although Carolyn knew who she was, she didn't distrust Alicia. She had weighed out everything that Alicia had done in her head, and it had added up to good, not evil. Alicia knew that only Riddick could save both of them now, because death was flying at them in the form of a demon, and it wasn't choosy about who it killed.

Suddenly both Carolyn and Alicia's feet got yanked from under them, just in time to feel a gust of air and see something fly by just over her head. Hitting the ground, she heard a scream and a horrible squelching sound followed by a thud. Then silence. Something warm and liquid hit her face, but was washed away before she had time to even wonder what it had been. By now, so much of her hurt, and she felt so very sleepy…maybe it would be better to just sleep here, after all, the rain was soothing against her skin and the ground wasn't too hard. Then another angry screech tore through the air, and she groggily moved, her brain moving on standby, on electrical signals that had been programmed to run. On the other side of Riddick, where Carolyn had been, there was nothing but a small pool of blood that was swiftly washing away, and the bottle full of blue light. She had been there only a moment ago, and now gone…torn from existence in a matter of seconds. Alicia stared at it for a long time, staring into the darkness where she had disappeared, her bicep still bleeding, sending rivers of red down her arm.  
"I'm sorry…" She whispered into the night, all the while knowing that Carolyn couldn't hear her. That it was too late for meaningless apologies. Looking down at Riddick, who had still not moved, though she could see him breathing, she took a deep breath, steadying herself before she broke down completely. I can do this…I can save him… Picking up both her flashlight and Carolyn's discarded lamp, she clipped the flashlight to the back of her jeans with some difficulty, pointing up so that her back was lit up brightly.

"Come on Riddick…come on…we're almost there!" She said hoarsely, trying not to cry as she tried to pull the unmoving figure to his feet. Alicia knew that every creature within a mile could smell her, she was bleeding so badly, and she needed to move, before it was too late. Riddick didn't move, and she only managed to flip him on to his back, and she stared down at him with a sob. Pounding her ineffective fists on his chest, she wanted to scream at him to get up. For something like a half-second, her mind toyed with the idea of leaving him behind, but it was banished as soon as it came. She couldn't leave him. Still, Riddick didn't move, and his eyes were closed. A mixture of desperate and frustrated, her eyes scanned his face for a moment, her fists stopping their relentless tirade against his chest. He looked so peaceful for once, the anger that usually was constantly present on his face was gone for the moment.

Now was most decidedly not the time to be thinking about these things, but Alicia couldn't help it. Knowing that the two of them would be trapped within a small skiff along with a twelve-year old girl and a holy man who would likely frown upon anything more than a tiny kiss. Though they hadn't done that yet. Hell, she had no proof that Riddick felt anything for her other than a sense of responsibility. It was his fault that she was in this hellish situation anyway, so he might have felt bad and decided to spend his entire life looking out for her. Though she doubted Riddick would do anything that didn't directly help him out. Still staring down at his face, she found herself moving closer until her face was only a few inches above his, her breath pushing lightly against his skin. Knowing that this was the only chance she might have to catch Riddick unaware, she hovered for a moment, then gently pressed her lips against his. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she was aware that there was movement to either side of her, but hadn't quite registered it before suddenly two arms had wrapped themselves around her back, pulling her closer and deeper into the kiss she had crazily started at the most unhelpful time to start it. Not that she was thinking about that, mind you.

Luckily enough, a creature took that moment to screech out somewhere in the darkness, bringing Alicia effectively back to her senses, and she managed to pull her head up. Opening her eyes, she looked down at Riddick, who's silver eyes were a mixture of shock and amusement. Smiling wearily, she pulled away easily as he released his hold around her.

"Let's remember this conversation for later." She said with a smile, and was surprised when she earned a light chuckle from Riddick, who was sitting up slowly, and she helped him to his feet. He was still stumbling, and she pulled one of his arms over her shoulder to steady him, still shining her light around. They were nearly there, a few more steps…just a few more…Riddick stopped about two steps from the ramp, and she looked at him, and he was looking down at something, and she could see the smouldering anger in his eyes. Following his eye-line, she found the dead body of Johns, still lying where it had landed.

"What's it doing here?" He asked, looking at her, and she swallowed, not wanting to get into it. "How did he come back?" Alicia looked up at him with pleading eyes, and his expression softened. He let it drop, thankfully, but she knew he would address it. Later. Then they both turned and hobbled together up, back into the light of freedom.

________________________________________  
All was quiet in the skiff. Jack and Imam had finally fallen asleep, but sleep refused to come to Alicia. Too many things haunted her mind; fear, anxiety…and guilt. She could have saved Carolyn if she'd just reacted a bit faster. Could have pulled her down and out of the way, but she hadn't, and now Carolyn was dead. Feasted on by some creature. She didn't deserve to die like that…she should've lived to be one hundred years old, and had a lot of children and grandchildren, and been at a older folks home on a tropical planet, maybe Solaris IV. Instead, because of Alicia's slow reflexes, she had died on some dark planet, too young, with no children or grandchildren. She'd died in the company of two convicts, instead of people who loved her. Staring out at the endless void of stars and planets in front of her, alive, when she had come close to dying something like ten times during the past two days, Alicia had never felt so awful.

Her right arm was pretty much fully bandaged, although the shoulder had apparently popped itself back into place when she'd fallen. Riddick had refused to do anything until all her wounds were taken care of, so he'd set the skiff on auto-pilot for the time being, and then turned to her. Seeing the bottle of antiseptic he held in his hand, she'd squealed and tried to talk him out of it, but nothing, repeat, nothing stands in the way of a determined Riddick. In the end, he pinned her right arm with his free arm, while getting Jack to pin the other one, and then poured the antiseptic all over the wounds, which hissed and bubbled at the contact. Although she'd been expecting the pain this time, it still didn't stop her from writhing like a snake, in serious pain, as Riddick had quickly begun wrapping bandages around the various cuts and scrapes on her arms. When that arm was finished, he'd nodded at Jack, and they'd both released her at once and she'd lay back on the deck of the skiff, breathing hard, her arm still hurting.

"Better?" Riddick had asked mockingly, and she'd glared at him before bandaging the rest of her wounds herself. Damn him and his antiseptic…that stuff was made by the Devil. Now, however, covered in bandages and still in her ripped and blood stained clothing, she was grateful. Grateful that he was alive, and grateful that he had the sense to put antiseptic on her cuts to keep them from getting infected. When she'd cooled off a bit (and Jack had dozed off) he had gently offered forth some sort of painkiller. Having been attempting to hide the fact that the adrenaline was gone and everything was burning in pain, she had taken it reluctantly, downing the pill, and was surprised to find the pain vanish almost instantly. Her pride kept her from thanking him right away, but judging by the knowing look in his eyes, she hadn't needed to say anything.

Now, however, that all the excitement of cleaning everybody up was over (including Riddick, who had stubbornly refused to have his leg taken care of until she'd threatened him with the antiseptic), she was able to retreat into her own thoughts. Not a place that she was happy visiting at the moment. She sat curled up in the co-pilots seat, alone at the moment, for Riddick had disappeared into the back to check up on some mechanical piece of equipment that she didn't even pretend to understand. It was her fault that Carolyn was dead, not just because she had slow reflexes. If she hadn't got careless, and fallen behind the others, Riddick would have never left the others behind, and they would have all made it back safely. Now, however, Carolyn was dead, and so, she assumed, was Suleiman, whose disappearance nobody had bothered to explain to her.

As if called by her thoughts of sadness, Riddick appeared next to her, sitting down in the pilot seat, pressing buttons, while looking out at the stars. He had the lights set down to twenty percent, so that he could comfortably walk around without his goggles, and the others could see where they were going without banging into things. Even in the partial light, his eyes glimmered like two hidden jewels in the night, and she felt a bit better as she watched him for a moment before turning her eyes back to the endless void ahead of them.  
"You should rest." He said suddenly, and she glanced over at him to find that he was looking directly at her, his eyes piercing into her soul, as if he could read her troubled thoughts. "You must be tired." He was right, she was completely wiped of all energy…but the fact was she was afraid to sleep. Afraid of what would crop up from the darkest corners of her imagination.  
"I can't sleep." She lied, not looking at him, managing to hold back the yawn with difficulty. Why was it that every time you say 'I can't sleep' or 'I'm not tired', you immediately have the urge to yawn? Smiling at him lightly, she pulled her knees to her chest, staring out into the stars, wondering to herself which one was Earth. Not that it mattered. As much as she wanted her life to go back to normal, she knew it never would. The only person she could depend on now…was Riddick.

"Can't?" Riddick said, not looking at her, staring out into space as well, before continuing slyly. "Or won't?" Looking over at him, she could tell by the knowing way he glanced at her, that he knew her better than she thought. He knew that she was exhausted, and knew that if she were to just close her eyes and lean her head back, she would doze off in a second. He knew that she wouldn't let herself do that, and he probably knew why too. He knew that she was afraid of seeing their faces again…right before they were swept away from existence forever. Reaching up with one hand to adjust her glasses, she stopped when she remembered they weren't there. Riddick glanced at her, noticing the motion, and smiled to himself, raising himself up a bit to dig into his pocket.

"That reminds me…" Looking at him curiously, she gasped as he held forth the last things in the world she had expected to ever see again. Taking her lack of movement as a seeming invitation, he leaned forward and gently slid the frames on to her nose, so that his face was only a foot away from hers, and she suddenly realised that her heart was pounding like a jackhammer in her chest. The glasses were bent so that they sat crookedly on her nose, but the lenses were mostly intact, so that every curve of his muscles was now in sharp focus, as well as the glint off his eyes, and her breath hitched in her throat as he moved his face a bit closer. "…wasn't there a conversation we needed to finish?"

He didn't really give her a chance to answer (not that she had anything to really say in response to that) before he pressed his lips against hers. Locked into a kiss that she would have never expected would ever happen (other than maybe in the heat of the moment in the middle of Hell…), she found herself being picked up slightly and carried forward until Riddick re-settled on to his chair, his arms wrapped around her, holding her close. Pulling her head away for a moment, she looked down into his eyes, her green ones shining in their reflection, as if she had had a shine job of her own. How much she wanted to hear him say those words, so that she could repeat them without feeling foolish. I love you, Richard B. Riddick. But do you love me? Leaning in again, she let herself sink into the quiet oblivion that was Riddick.

"Get a room, guys." She heard a young, sleepy voice call from somewhere behind in the dark, and she couldn't help but laugh lightly as she pulled away again, resting her forehead against his. Jack. Riddick growled lightly, and she knew if it weren't for her own humiliation, he would have definitely continued on the course they'd been headed. Instead, he let her turn around so that she was facing the front, his arms around her stomach, and she leaned her head back against his shoulder.

"Little brat…" Riddick mumbled, and the pleasant rumble of his voice slid through her like hot chocolate on a cold winter's day. For a long time they sat in silence, staring out at the stars that suddenly seemed so much more bright and hopeful to her. Her fears seemed silly as she felt his warm arms around her, keeping her safe, and as she looked out, she suddenly felt the weariness weighing her down, clenching to her bones. Her eyelids slowly drooped closed, as her head slid to one side.

"I love you Riddick..." Were her last mumbled words before sliding into dreamland. Although when she awoke she would only be aware of thinking these words, Riddick would never forget them. For a long time he sat silent, staring into the void, before standing up, picking up Alicia with him. Walking to the back, he carefully set her down in the last free bed. As he gently pulled the sheets up around her, looking down into her peacefully sleeping face, before he opened his mouth and whispered the words back to her, all the while knowing that she couldn't hear him. With that, he turned and retreated to the pilot's chair, staring out without seeing, caught in an inner turmoil between love and fear.

((Phew. That took a long time. I kept re-writing it and revising it and it took a long time until it was the way I wanted. I'm still not sure if it's the way I want…but hopefully you guys will like it. So yeah. It's not the last chapter :-)))


	11. Goodbye

((Wow, more than a year and a half since I last updated this fanfiction…there's so many things I want to go back and edit, but I think I'll settle with finishing this story off before I maybe start off on a new one (this one to do with COR, maybe? If everybody wants me to). I'm sorry I've neglected you guys but I kind of lost interest in Pitch Black for a long time…and then I had school and life to attend to. But I'm here guys, and I'm going to finish this story if it kills me. And oh my goodness I forgot how hot Vin Diesel is…wow…))

When Alicia awoke again, it was very quiet. It was also very dark and for a very brief moment Alicia had the disoriented feeling of not being sure if she were awake or still asleep. Once she figured out she was awake, it was an even more difficult process to rouse up the brainpower to remember where she was. Then it all came back to her, every detail crisp and clear in her mind in the way that only a completely fresh mind can muster up. Taking a slow, deep breath, she turned and stood up slowly, ignoring the harsh cold metal flooring on her bare feet, waiting for a moment as her eyes began to get used to the dark. Alicia had never liked the dark, she'd been terrified of it as a child and even though the child-like fears were gone, their echo haunted her adult mind. It didn't help that she'd just gone through the most traumatic experience of her life, which had all taken place in complete and utter darkness.

Moving forward once she was secure enough in her sight to be sure of not banging into things, she wandered into the cockpit, expecting to find her confidante sitting there serenely but she found it strangely empty. Taking a seat in the pilot's chair, she took a glance at the controls and dials, trying to determine where they were, but the fact was even if she could figure it out, she wouldn't understand what the numbers meant. Looking out through the view point, all she could see was a lot of stars, dotted here and there with a faraway planet. Still a long trip before they got home. She glanced back to where Jack and Imam were both sleeping and frowned: Riddick was nowhere in sight. The emergency skif was currently on autopilot and she sank back into the chair, staring out into what felt like never-ending darkness.

Suddenly, as quickly as the silence had fallen upon her, it was broken, a low beeping sound heralding its arrival. Just as quickly as the silence was broken, the view screen was suddenly very much less empty as a very large ship suddenly came into view from above. Suddenly where there had been endless stars there was a large metal plate bearing the words 'Theodora' followed by a series of numbers and letters. Standing up, Alicia stared, her mouth agape, not sure how to react or who to tell. "Riddick…?" She called backwards and turned, looking for him and screamed slightly and jumped as he suddenly came down from above, where he had apparently been doing chin-ups from a pipe on the ceiling. For a moment they both just stared at each other.

He had put back up his mask and his shields, his gaze cool and calculating, no trace of the affection that had been there earlier. His eyes were ungoggled and they gazed down at her, glowing in the dark as she stared right back up at him, her tongue tied in her mouth. Before either of them could say a word, a voice came from behind them.  
"Merchant vessel Theodora to emergency vessel 499 is there anybody aboard?" Riddick moved forward past her without a word and pressed some buttons, beckoning her closer. "When I say, so tell them that we're here and that we need pick-up." Riddick said, and for a moment Alicia didn't realize he was talking to her until he nodded and she cleared her throat and started speaking awkwardly.

"Yes, yes, we're here…there's three of us here. We require pick-up and transport to the nearest major planet." Alicia said, her voice tired and with the ragged blankness that comes with having come through Hell and finding oneself back in the normal. Nothing seems to affect you quite as much as it used to.

"Okay. Turn off you're autopilot and then we'll pull you in. You're in safe hands now." With that, the connection cut out and Alicia looked down where Riddick had severed the connection. She stared at him quietly, knowing she should go awaken Imam and Jack, but not moving.

"You're not coming with us…" Alicia said this more as a statement than a question and Riddick looked down, but said nothing. "Let me come with you, please…" Riddick still said nothing and pushed past her, moving with a sort of sleek power, like a panther or a wildcat before he stopped at the opposite end of the skif, his back to Alicia. Alicia stared down at the ground, tears filling her eyes and trailing down her cheeks.

"You don't want my life, Alicia…" Riddick said quietly, his voice reaching her as if from far away. "You don't." Alicia shook her head and started to walk across the small space, stopping halfway before starting to speak, her voice cracking slightly with emotion.

"No, you're right…I don't want your life. But I've got it and I had it before I even came…you gave it to me already. I'm willing to be there for you. I'm willing to hide and to do what I'm told. And I know the rules, I know them, you don't even have to tell me…" She eyed him desperately, but he showed no reaction, no tensing of his muscles or twitch of his head to indicate he was even listening to her plea. "Riddick…I…I care for you. I don't know why or even if I should, but I do. You can't change that…you can't change how I feel. You may control a lot of things, Riddick, but you can't control how I feel."

There was silence for what felt like a long time, as they stood on opposite ends of the skif, and behind her she could hear the skif whirring as the merchant vessel began to pull them into their cargo bay. Alicia felt, in that moment, the most vulnerable that she had in what felt like a very long time. She had bared her soul, allowed him to take it or leave it, and she had nothing left to lose.

"You would do everything I'd say?" He said finally, and she looked up, afraid to even dare to hope what he meant. "Even if what I say is to stay with Imam and Jack? If I tell you to stay with them, because they can keep you safer than I ever could, would you do it?" Alicia's heart dropped into her stomach as he turned around, tears filling her eyes and he looked at her, standing there, vulnerable and trampled and a quiet sob escaped her as she slowly nodded her head.

"Then that's it then…" Alicia said, her voice breaking as she looked at him, and he moved closer, but not quite close enough to touch. "That's it. That's our beginning and our end…all in the space of a day." He came closer still and carefully, as if it were a motion he was not used to, he wrapped his arms around her, drawing her against his chest where she rested her head, feeling his heartbeat beat against her ear.

"I'm sorry…" He whispered, and then suddenly the door began to open behind her and he disappeared up into the rafters before she could even say goodbye. Taking a deep breath, she leaned down and shook Jack and Imam awake carefully, wiping her face carefully, before they all slowly walked down the ramp towards waiting medical teams. Alicia turned once and looked back at the seemingly empty skif, where dials still beeped quietly.

"Goodbye Riddick…" She whispered, and then the skif closed up behind her and she re-joined Imam and Jack without a second look back. It was time to move on.

((There you go guys. It's very short I know, it's just to try and close it off. I tried to do what I thought Riddick would do…and honestly I didn't want to try and push it farther. It was confusing trying to continue the 'relationship' and still stay true to Riddick's character…I think I'll stage a reunion for them in my next story. If I write another one, we'll see. Well that's it guys…I hope you enjoyed it.))


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